The Beautiful Pool

Awwww. The entry forms for the 2026 Beautiful Pool are starting to trickle in. It’s nice to know you guys are still out there. I’m especially happy that there are newbies getting in on the action. Welcome Rick, Theo, and John.

For those of you who are still cogitating, here’s some stuff that might help.

Joachim Klement is an analyst with Panmure Liberum, (a UK investment bank) who has developed a model that successfully predicted the winner of every World Cup since 2014. There is a history of investment banks trying to use their “expertise” to pick WC winners. I think it generally works about as well as their ability to pick stock market winners, but that’s a discussion for another time and another blog.

In his analysis of the 2026 competition, Joachim gives a lot of information that may (or may not) be helpful to you in making your picks. For example, this table shows the likely winners of each Group:

If you want to know more about how he came up with his predictions, you can read the whole 20 page report here:

It goes without saying, or it should, that I am not endorsing Joachim’s model. Use at your own risk!

The first match is now 3 weeks away. Time to start working on your picks.

And, please, tell your friends. What’s the worst that could happen? Even if they completely crash and burn, they come last and I return their entry fee. That’s not so bad.

Stuart

PS: I edited the Rules and Regulations to include PayPal as an additional means of payment. Note too that Newbie John told me the fees to use Wise can be prohibitive if you don’t have an account. Caveat emptor.