“High intensity?”

He continues: “A national team coach brings players together, adds his own philosophy, while taking national culture into account. But the way players perform with their clubs has a very, very strong influence.”

One clear example is the Spain national team, which won back-to-back European Championships (2008 and 2012) and the 2010 World Cup, relying heavily on the dominant Barcelona side of that era.

So how exactly can this edition of the World Cup be won?

With tactical systems evolving at elite clubs, the best national teams in the world, in Europe and South America, along with perhaps Morocco, Senegal, and Japan, may be the most capable of borrowing elements from those club playing styles.

There is fast counterattacking football, which Paris Saint Germain have demonstrated with deadly effect in the Champions League, and which Argentina used to score their stunning second goal in the 2022 World Cup final against France.

Dallas Stadium. (AFP)

France coach Didier Deschamps said a few months after that match: “The key moment in a football match is the transition from defence to attack, when the opponent has no time.”

In order to regain the ball quickly, many of the world’s best teams today play with a high press.

Roxburgh, 82, who has followed the development of international football since managing Scotland at the 1990 World Cup, says: “What has changed is the speed of the game. The pressure on the ball carrier has become much more intense.”

He adds: “So collective play at international level today is more advanced than it used to be.”

He explains: “In the past it depended heavily on individual stars, today the stars play for the team.”

Set pieces

However, the energy required to apply this high pressing style could run into a major issue in this World Cup edition: the summer heat in North America.

Roxburgh adds: “I know we will get water breaks, but that may not be enough to allow teams to press and play at a high tempo.”

He continues: “We will see. Coach Jesse Marsch, who strongly believes in high pressing in Canada, may be able to do it, but I am not sure it will be easy in some parts of the United States or even in Mexico.”

There is also a simpler factor that has become a defining feature of this season in the English Premier League: the weapon of set pieces and long throws.

England coach, the German Thomas Tuchel, said earlier this season: “These things will play a role. All these patterns are back, as well as crosses.”

Set pieces are one aspect of the game that coaches can directly control, while the hydration breaks lasting three minutes, which FIFA will introduce in the middle of each half during the World Cup, may also prove to be important for them.

Gilberto Silva, the former Arsenal midfielder and 2002 World Cup winner with Brazil, now part of FIFA’s technical study group, said: “These could be important moments from a tactical point of view.”

He adds: “Now they have two additional opportunities, along with half time, to make changes. That is a big advantage for them.”