Chris Sutton predicts round of 32 at 2026 World Cup; users do better than expert – Ecuador shocks Germany

Sixteen of the 48 countries are out; the remaining 32 are preparing for the first knockout round towards the final at the MetLife Stadium near New York on July 19. BBC Sport analyst Chris Sutton has shared his predictions for the round of 32, with notable bills including England against DR Congo and title holders Argentina against surprise side Cape Verde.

In the final round of the group stage, attention was mainly focused on the predictions of fans, Sutton and an AI model in the new BBC pool. In the Cape Verde–Saudi Arabia match, both Sutton and the AI ​​predicted a defeat for the island team, while 39% of the more than 50,000 participating users rightly went for a draw and 43% even bet on a win for Cape Verde.

However, the biggest blow came from a different angle: Ecuador surprised almost everyone by beating Germany. From more than 56,000 entries, only 597 users correctly chose an Ecuadorian victory.


Over the entire final group program, Sutton and the AI each got 15 out of 24 predictions correct, while the users scored best at 17 out of 24. After 72 of the 104 World Cup matches, Sutton has a total of 41 correct predictions (57%), the AI ​​has 43 (60%) and the users lead with 48 (67%).

Ahead of the tournament, Sutton also listed the expected final scores in all 12 groups. He got seven group winners correct and correctly predicted the entire order in three groups.

The AI ​​predictions were generated using Microsoft Copilot Chat, with the simple task of predicting the results of the matches in the round of 32. In the BBC pool, readers can also choose their winner for each knockout match.

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