“Group of death”

Definition

A group so stacked that even a genuinely good team is likely going home early. Only the top finishers advance, so when you pile three or four strong sides together, someone good is guaranteed to get knocked out before the knockouts even start.

Origin

Coined by Mexican journalists as “grupo de la muerte” at the 1970 World Cup, describing the brutal group of England, Brazil, Czechoslovakia and Romania. It went mainstream in English language media around the 1986 World Cup and has been a staple ever since.

Used in a sentence

“Haiti got the short straw — they landed in the group of death with five-time champions Brazil and 2022 semifinalists Morocco.”