Croatia are obviously going to have a scheme to thwart Argentina captain Lionel Messi from having as little influence in the outcome of the match as possible. However, the schemes to work, their needs to be ideas.

France needed the help of the first World Cup penalty awarded after a video review and a deflected Paul Pogba goal to get their World Cup campaign underway with a 2-1 win over Australia on Saturday.

You can’t ask for a better start to a World Cup as far as the first couple of days of Russia 2018 is concerned.

Bangladesh has been ranked 20th among the football playing nations of Asia by the global football body, as the FIFA World Cup starts in Russia.

FIFA World Cup FIxtures

The 2026 World Cup will be held in the United States, Mexico and Canada after FIFA's congress voted overwhelmingly on Wednesday to back the tri-nation joint bid for the tournament and leave Morocco to miss out for the fifth time.

Nobody would have hand-picked the tournament's two worst teams to launch the 2018 World Cup, but when Russia and Saudi Arabia meet on Thursday form will be irrelevant as the world's biggest sporting festival explodes into life in Moscow.

Over the next month, Russia will serve up a football stroganoff spiced with enthralling matches, a dash of the world's finest players and the biggest prize in the sporting world -- the FIFA World Cup.

The flags are out, jerseys ready and excitement is at its peak as the world anxiously awaits the FIFA World Cup to kick off in Russia today. It is the tournament where we have the amazing confluence of football's best players coming together in one spot.

The stage is all set in Russia. Time for all eyes to turn to Moscow as the greatest show on Earth is about to get underway at the Luzhniki Stadium today.

It has been like rainbow after rain in Moscow for the last couple of days as fans from across the world have thronged the Russian capital and other cities in their thousands ahead of the World Cup, which kicks off at the Luzhniki Stadium today.

Russia is all set to host the biggest show on Earth, the football world Cup that returns every four years to captivate the world sport fraternity.

The most global countdown ticks towards a zero. And, within a few hours, an O-shaped object is set to be kicked around by some fleet-footed magicians on the manicured greens of

Around 400 eager fans turned out at Argentina's World Cup base camp to catch a glimpse of Lionel Messi and his teammates at an open training session.

Germany landed in Moscow on Tuesday to attempt to successfully defend their World Cup title and hoping to leave the political controversy surrounding Mesut Ozil and Ilkay Gundogan behind them.

Brazil arrived in Russia on Monday hungry to make amends for their World Cup humiliation in 2014 with Neymar apparently fighting fit.

Jogo Bonito, The Beautiful game. It is a phrase that will always be associated with Brazil. The five-time World champions have had some great sides in the past and while their style faltered in recent World Cups, Tite has revived Brazil for the Russia World Cup.

The High Court clears the way for hoisting national flags of foreign nations across the country during the upcoming FIFA World Cup tournament.

Brazilian superstar Neymar says he has no desire to be Brazil's all-time leading scorer despite being third in the Selecao's charts.

Each goal scored by Argentina captain Lionel Messi or Brazilian superstar Neymar at the upcoming World Cup will lead to 10,000 meals being donated to school children in the Caribbean and Latin America.