The day World Cup 2022 started Spanish teacher Jennifer Dessert knew exactly what team she was going to support: her home team Spain, who were the 2010 World Cup champions.

This isn’t the first year Dessert has been following along with the World Cup.

“When I lived in Spain I had the opportunity to be a part of the general atmosphere of the World Cup,” Dessert said. “So probably for the last two or three World Cups I’ve been into it.”

Senora Dessert isn’t alone with her support of the World Cup. Sophomore Danielle Lenihan has also shown major interest as this world-wide tournament has gone on. 

“Honestly, this is my first year getting into it,” Lenihan said. “I’m pretty into it this year.”

Along with Lenihan, this is also sophomore Ellouise Sill’s first time watching the World Cup.

“I’ve always heard about the past World Cups as they’ve gone on,” Sill said. “But this is my first year really watching it.”

There are a total of 64 games played to decide the winners of FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022. 

The tournament consists of eight round-robin groups followed by a knockout round for 16 teams.  

This World Cup has already advanced to the semi-finals, and 4 of the 32 teams are knocked out, including the team’s Dessert and Lenihan have been supporting from the beginning. 

Dessert’s team, Spain, didn’t make it past the round of 16 due to a loss against Morocco in penalties. 

“My least favorite team in the whole world right now is Morocco because they beat Spain,” Dessert said. 

Lenihan’s team, Brazil, did make it pretty far but fell short in the quarter-finals against Croatia.

Fortunately for Sill, Argentina is still going strong and headed to the semi-finals where they will face Croatia to advance to the finals. 

“I like Argentina because I think they’re a really well-rounded team,” Sill said. “I also really like Messi, and I think they have a good chance to win it all.

One of the major factors in what’s kept this World Cup so interesting is the amount of upsets there’s been so far.

The first major upset came in the group C opener where Saudi Arabia defeated Argentina 2-1.

“It wasn’t my favorite because Argentina lost but Saudi Arabia vs. Argentina was exciting to see an underdog win,” Sill said. 

Another major upset came in the round of 16 when Morocco defeated Spain in order to advance to the quarter-finals. 

“I guess it was really, really fun and extremely exciting for me to watch Morocco and Spain play,” Dessert said, even after watching her team lose. “I mean, it’s not my favorite upset.” 

The World Cup 2022 is being held in Qatar, which is in Middle East Asia, sharing a part of the world students might not know about. 

“I feel like it kind of opened up the world beyond Europe and maybe beyond some other places that it might have been held,” Dessert said. “It’s kind of a place that nobody really saw before or knew what it was like, so I liked that part that it was like, ‘Oh, this is actually, you know, a participating part of the world.’ It’s not just this desert out in the middle of nowhere.”