XtraTime Web Desk: FIFA World Cup 2018 is all geared to break all the records of the past, as rightly quoted by Mike Powell, “Records are meant to be broken”.
Egyptian goalkeeper and Captain, Essam El-Hadary, 45 years and five months will be the oldest player to play in this tournament. He will be surpassing Columbian keeper Faryd Mondragon who was 43 years and three days old while performing in the previous World Cup.
Miroslav Klose might be surpassed by Thomas Mueller in goal scoring. In the previous tournament, Klose Klose did surpass Brazilian Ronaldo (15) during his 16th goal during Germany’s &-1 against Brazil in the semifinals. In this third tournament, Mueller scored only 10 goals even though he doesn’t play in the main striker’s position.
Apart from Lionel Messi, no other player in the competition’s history has won the coveted Golden Ball twice with his barnstorming performance. However, chances are high that Messi might again set another record in this upcoming World Cup in Russia.
Zinedine Zidane, Cafu, and Rafael Marquez together are the holders of the infamous record of most cards received in the international level with six cards each. We can expect the 39-year-old Marquez to surpass others on this chart.
Argentina and Germany presently share the record for most wins via penalty shootouts with four each. Between the two, Germany has been the more clinical one with 4 wins out of four shootouts, whereas Argentina has participated in the most number of shootouts viz five with their only loss coming ironically at the hands of Germany.