World Cup 2026 Group C preview: Brazil are cruising, but it's Morocco — not Scotland — to fear

Group C carries a whiff of 1998. The last time Scotland reached a World Cup, they were drawn alongside Brazil and Morocco and trudged home bottom of the table. Twenty-eight years on the same three nations are reunited, with Haiti making up the four, and Scotland still arrive lugging the same unwanted record: no escape from a World Cup group in eight attempts. Brazil should win this section. The only question worth arguing about is who joins them, and our model's answer isn't the sentimental one.

## Brazil: favourites, even at half-strength Carlo Ancelotti takes charge of a Brazil that would rather outscore its problems than solve them at the back. Vinícius Júnior, Raphinha and Matheus Cunha give him a forward line most coaches would kill for, while Casemiro and Bruno Guimarães do the unglamorous shielding in front of a defence missing the injured Éder Militão. The attacking depth has taken a battering: Rodrygo and Estêvão are both out, which is how a 34-year-old Neymar, knee not fully right, talked his way back into the 26 after Ancelotti spent months swearing he'd only pick players who were fully fit. Call it a wobble, not a crisis. With Alisson behind Marquinhos and that much firepower up top, Brazil are clear favourites and should be through with a game to spare.

## Morocco: our model's pick for second Here's the call worth chewing over. Sentiment says Scotland. The numbers say the Atlas Lions, and the football backs the numbers. Morocco swept their CAF qualifying group, scoring for fun and conceding next to nothing, then lifted the 2025 Africa Cup of Nations on home soil in front of their own fans. The spine of the 2022 semi-finalists is still here, marshalled by captain Achraf Hakimi, who has a decent shout as the best right-back on the planet, with Brahim Díaz pulling strings and Yassine Bounou behind them. This is a team that defends like adults and has the tournament scar tissue Scotland simply haven't built yet. The live table doesn't make this a coin-flip; it makes Morocco the side to beat for second, and the gap to the Scots is real.

## Scotland: the romance, with a hard ceiling Ending a 28-year exile was glorious, and Scott McTominay's acrobatic finish against Denmark at Hampden was the image of the whole campaign that carried Steve Clarke's men through. McTominay is the engine: Napoli have freed him into a goalscoring midfielder, and so much of what Scotland do runs through him and skipper Andy Robertson. The worry is at the other end. Who actually scores? Clarke is still shuffling Che Adams, Lawrence Shankland and Ross Stewart without ever settling on a No.9, and his goalkeeping options are thin enough to make you nervous. Against Brazil's attack and a Morocco side that doesn't panic, brave and compact only takes you so far. Scotland are in the fight for second, but they're chasing it, not leading it.

## Haiti: the underdogs who shouldn't be here Haiti's presence is the romance of the group. This is only their second World Cup, 52 years on from their first, and they got here by topping a CONCACAF group that contained Costa Rica and Honduras without playing a single home match, basing themselves in Curaçao because of the unrest back home. Coach Sébastien Migné has, remarkably, never even set foot in the country he leads. The squad is almost entirely diaspora: Wolves' Jean-Ricner Bellegarde, Sunderland's Wilson Isidor and record scorer Duckens Nazon. A first World Cup point in their history would be a party. Prising one off this group looks a step too far.

## The fixtures that decide it - Haiti vs Scotland (13 June, Boston) — Scotland's must-win opener. Drop points to the group's minnows and second base starts slipping away on day one. - Scotland vs Morocco (19 June, Boston) — the de facto runners-up play-off, and the match our model treats as the pivot of the whole group. - Scotland vs Brazil (24 June, Miami) — likely with the qualifying maths already settled, a straight rerun of that 1998 opener.

## The verdict Brazil to win the group at a stroll, Rodrygo and Estêvão or not. Morocco to take second: better organised, deeper, and hardened by deep tournament runs in a way this Scotland team isn't yet. The Tartan Army will dream, and good on them, but the 19 June meeting in Boston is where this group gets decided, and I'm backing the champions of Africa to come through it.

Our model is statistical, not prophetic — see the methodology for how the probabilities are built.

Follow the group live — odds and our model's pick for every match: Brazil vs Morocco, Haiti vs Scotland, Scotland vs Morocco, Brazil vs Haiti, Scotland vs Brazil, Morocco vs Haiti.