Eight of the ten most populous countries are not in the World Cup

The case of China is perhaps more puzzling. In recent decades, it has become one of the most successful countries in Olympic history. But its foray into men’s soccer has not yielded similar results.

“There is no reason (in theory) why China cannot produce world-class footballers,” believes Beijing-based Chinese football expert Mark Dreyer.

“The main problem is that in China everything is controlled by the state and everything is top-down. You need football-loving people to make football decisions, but there is too much political interference.”

China has not returned to the World Cup since 2002 despite huge investment in the sport since the 2010s – which has included flooding its professional leagues with various high-profile names from South American and European football to improve the standard of play.

Like China, Indonesia has tasted the World Cup once before – in 1938, when it competed as the Dutch East Indies, a colony of the Netherlands.

The South East Asian team had a good run in 2026 though, reaching the final qualifying round.

But that performance is perhaps better explained by the decision to recruit European players with Indonesian heritage rather than relying on homegrown talent.

“There were sometimes eight or nine European-born players in Indonesia’s starting XI,” said Jerome Wirawan, news editor for the BBC’s Indonesian service.

Pakistan and Bangladesh exited the Asian qualifiers in the group stage, without a win in six matches. Pakistan was also banned from international football three times between 2017 and 2025 by FIFA for political infighting in its governing body.