As the qualifying groups for the World Cup in 2022 come to a close, some big teams have found themselves at risk of not qualifying.

The qualifying stages for next year’s World Cup in Qatar are reaching their climax with the different continental confederations preparing for the final stages and eventual conclusion of the qualifiers.

Some of the national teams who have already qualified for the tournament include Germany, Brazil, England, France, Belgium, The Netherlands, Spain, and Argentina. There are still some high profile national teams who have not yet confirmed their qualification for next year’s tournament including two-time champions Uruguay, 2016 European champions Portugal and African dark horses such as Nigeria, Cameroon, Algeria, Senegal, and Ghana. The African national teams are yet to complete their confederation final round of qualifiers ahead of next year’s tournament and will determine which teams qualify for the tournament.

Paris Saint-Germain and Argentina star Lionel Messi was part of Argentina as a captain who earlier this year captained his side to glory in Copa America as well as winning his first international trophy.

Lionel Messi celebrates goal at the 2018 World Cup for Argentina against Nigeria by Kirill Venediktov

The Asian national teams have also reached the final stages of their qualification process for next year’s tournament with the traditional heavyweight nations such as South Korea, Australia, Japan, and Saudi Arabia who have all made it to the final round of the qualifiers for the Asian section.

In the South American section several national teams such as Brazil and Argentina have already qualified for the World Cup next winter but there are many national teams whose fate still has not been decided and could potentially be decided within the last few matches of the qualifiers including Colombia, Chile, Uruguay, Paraguay and Ecuador who could all still qualify.