EA Sports ran hundreds of simulations on its new FC 26 World Cup game for this summer’s tournament in the United States, Canada and Mexico, and revealed the most repeated outcomes, with Spain emerging as the most common winner, according to EA.
EA has a strong record with its World Cup simulations, having correctly predicted the winners of the past four tournaments — Spain in 2010, Germany in 2014, France in 2018 and Argentina in 2022 — and correctly naming Lionel Messi the Golden Ball winner in 2022, according to the company.
The simulations found 18-year-old Lamine Yamal to be the tournament’s top scorer in the most repeated results, while Pedri was the most frequent provider of assists for Spain, registering four in EA’s most common outcome. EA noted Spain’s recent form, pointing to their Euro 2024 title and recalling that Spain’s first World Cup win in 2010 followed victory at Euro 2008.
England’s Elliot Anderson emerged as the most common top assister across the simulations, a somewhat surprising result given he registered four assists in 38 Premier League appearances last season, EA said. The simulation output did not publish a single, definitive assist total for the tournament.
EA’s runs found the U.S. Men’s National Team most often eliminated in the round of 16, the same stage it exited at the last World Cup in a 3-1 loss to the Netherlands, though the U.S. will need to play an extra knockout stage game at the expanded tournament to reach that round, according to EA. The simulations also frequently produced a U.S. quarterfinal appearance.
Among U.S. players, EA’s results most often showed Malik Tillman as the team’s leading scorer ahead of Christian Pulisic and Folarin Balogun. Pulisic and Tillman appeared among the top assist makers, but Balogun took the assist crown in the most common simulations. The company also reported Tim Ream and Sergiño Dest as the U.S. players with the most yellow cards in the runs, and Brenden Aaronson as the team’s only red-card recipient across all simulated tournaments.
