{"id":4392,"date":"2018-05-25T15:21:33","date_gmt":"2018-05-25T14:21:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/?p=4392"},"modified":"2018-05-25T15:21:33","modified_gmt":"2018-05-25T14:21:33","slug":"world-cup-russia-everything-need-know","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/world-cup-russia-everything-need-know\/","title":{"rendered":"The World Cup in Russia &#8211; everything you need to know"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s just over three weeks until the World Cup kicks off in Russia &#8211; the hosts take on Saudi Arabia on Thursday, June 14 in the first Group A match &#8211; so this edition of everything you need to know is coming at you like a Cossack dance in a Russia World Cup Special.<\/p>\n<p>And if you want to keep in touch with friends, colleagues, clients or fellow football fans forth duration of the tournament, you can use <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/international-dial-in-numbers\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">ConferenceCall.co.uk <\/a>to speak to up to 100 other people simultaneously, using the local rate Russian dial-in number <strong>499-7043569<\/strong><span style=\"color: #4b4b4b;\">. If you&#8217;ve other business interests out in Russia, check out <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/exporting-to-russia-everything-you-need-to-know\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Exporting to Russia &#8211; everything you need to know<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>Now read on for all you need to know about the upcoming World Cup, as well as some handy trivia from previous tournaments.<!--more--><\/p>\n<h2>Russia 2018<\/h2>\n<p>Russia 2018 could be the last World Cup tournament to use the 32-team format, as discussions are underway to extend the tournament to 48 teams for Qatar 2022. A total of 64 games will be played between the opening game on June 14 and the final on July 15.<\/p>\n<p>World Cup games will be played in 12 different stadiums across 11 host cities:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Moscow<\/li>\n<li>St. Petersburg<\/li>\n<li>Sochi<\/li>\n<li>Kazan<\/li>\n<li>Nizhny Novgorod<\/li>\n<li>Ekaterinburg<\/li>\n<li>Saransk, Samara<\/li>\n<li>Volgograd<\/li>\n<li>Rostov-on-Don<\/li>\n<li>Kaliningrad.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>More than 3,000km and three time zones separate the most westerly World Cup venue, at Kaliningrad on the Baltic Sea, from Ekaterinburg, which is the farthest venue to the east.<\/p>\n<p>There will be seven nations at Russia 2018 that have previously won the World Cup &#8211; Defending champions Germany will be aiming to equal Brazil&#8217;s record of five wins, while the rest are:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Argentina (2)<\/li>\n<li>Uruguay (2)<\/li>\n<li>England (1)<\/li>\n<li>Spain (1)<\/li>\n<li>France (1).<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Notably, four-time winners Italy did not qualify &#8211; the first time in 60 years that they will miss a World Cup.<\/p>\n<h2>World Cup history<\/h2>\n<p>The first ever FIFA World Cup finals were played in Uruguay in 1930 and only four European teams made the two-week sea voyage across the Atlantic &#8211; Belgium, France, Yugoslavia and Romania.<\/p>\n<p>Uruguay beat Argentina 4-2 in the final of that tournament to become the first ever World Cup Champions.<\/p>\n<p>The host country also won the next tournament when it was held in Italy in 1934 &#8211; the tournament then took a 16-year hiatus as World War II intervened.<\/p>\n<p>In 1950 the tournament was held in Brazil but it was Urugauy who were once again crowned champions, beating the host nation in the final at the Maracana.<\/p>\n<p>The 1954 tournament in West Germany saw the trophy return to the host nation once more and it wasn&#8217;t until 1958 in Sweden that Brazil won the first of their\u00a0five\u00a0World Cups &#8211; the others coming in 1962 in Chile, 1970 in Mexico, USA in 1994 and Japan\/Korea in 2002.<\/p>\n<p>England didn&#8217;t enter the World Cup until 1950 and have only won it once, when they hosted the tournament in 1966.<\/p>\n<p>Spain became the first country to win a World Cup tournament outside of Europe when they beat the Netherlands 1-0 in the South Africa 2010 tournament.<\/p>\n<p>Germany became the first and only country to win the World Cup on South American soil when they beat Argentina in the final of the Brazil 2014 tournament.<\/p>\n<h2>World Cup Records<\/h2>\n<p>Brazil&#8217;s five World Cup final wins means they have won the trophy more times than any other nation.<\/p>\n<p>Ronaldo is the\u00a0tournament&#8217;s all time leading goalscorer, netting a total of 15 goals across three tournaments in 1998, 2002 and 2006.<\/p>\n<p>France&#8217;s Just Fontaine has scored the most goals in one tournament, bagging 13\u00a0as France finished third\u00a0in the 1958 finals in Sweden.<\/p>\n<p>The oldest player to take part in the World Cup Finals is Cameroon&#8217;s Roger Milla who was 42 when he scored five goals during Italia 90.<\/p>\n<p>The fastest goal scored in the World Cup finals came after 11 seconds when Turkey&#8217;s Hakan Suker netted against South Korea in the 2002 tournament.<\/p>\n<p>Brazil played host to the biggest ever crowd as 200,000 crammed into the Maracana to see hosts Brazil beaten in the 1950 final by South American rivals Uruguay.<\/p>\n<p>The youngest player ever to take to the pitch in the World Cup finals was Northern Ireland&#8217;s Norman Whiteside who was 17-years-and-one-week old when he played against Yugoslavia in the 1982 World Cup Finals in Spain.<\/p>\n<p>Germany&#8217;s Lothar Mattaeus has played more World Cup games than anyone else, notching up 25 appearances across five tournaments.<\/p>\n<p>France&#8217;s Zinedine Zidane is regarded as one of the finest players to ever grace a football pitch, but it seems he also one of the dirtiest, having racked up four yellow cards and two reds at World Cup Finals, more than any other player.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/conference-call\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-1777 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/conference-call-banner.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"118\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It&#8217;s just over three weeks until the World Cup kicks off in Russia &#8211; the hosts take on Saudi Arabia on Thursday, June 14 in the first Group A match<\/p>\n<div class=\"more-link-wrapper\"><a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/world-cup-russia-everything-need-know\/\">Read More<span class=\"screen-reader-text\">The World Cup in Russia &#8211; everything you need to know<\/span><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[22,2,13],"tags":[23,24],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v20.9 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The World Cup in Russia - everything you need to know - ConferenceCall.co.uk blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/world-cup-russia-everything-need-know\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The World Cup in Russia - everything you need to know - ConferenceCall.co.uk blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/world-cup-russia-everything-need-know\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"ConferenceCall.co.uk blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/Conference-Call-UK\/178511498997826\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-05-25T14:21:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/05\/image-of-soccer-stadium.png\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1024\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"512\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/png\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Les Roberts\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@LesRobertsMedia\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@ConfCallUK\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Les Roberts\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"4 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/world-cup-russia-everything-need-know\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/world-cup-russia-everything-need-know\/\",\"name\":\"The World Cup in Russia - everything you need to know - ConferenceCall.co.uk blog\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/#website\"},\"datePublished\":\"2018-05-25T14:21:33+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-05-25T14:21:33+00:00\",\"author\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/fd51b09e17d75360ba18197c2c1c535b\"},\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/world-cup-russia-everything-need-know\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-GB\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/world-cup-russia-everything-need-know\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/world-cup-russia-everything-need-know\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.conferencecall.co.uk\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"The World Cup in Russia &#8211; 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