scotia wrote:The four semi finalists are all European. So it looks like European teams have a higher standard.
For the longest time the World Cup alternated between being held in Europe and being held in the Americas. And it was a fairly reliable rule of thumb that a European team would always win when it was held in Europe and a Latin American team would always win when it was held in the Americas.
Historically the one exception was when the World Cup was held in Sweden in 1958, when Brazil won it. And much more recently when Germany won in Brazil in 2014.
This century the host country has been more diversified, with Japan/South Korea, South Africa and (next) Qatar hosting it. Even so, the pattern is usually that there is a home advantage that flatters the teams from the same continent as the host country.