This year's FIFA World Cup has lots of stars trying to win the trophy, Mbappe, Messi, Ronaldo, etc. But this is about the best players that did not qualify for the World Cup in Qatar.
Mohamed Salah: Egypt
Mohamed Salah, the Premier League’s player with the most most goals and assists last season was not able to lead Egypt to the World Cup, losing in penalties to Senegal in the final qualifying game, where the Senegal fans were using laser pointers to throw Salah off, which worked, as Salah hit his penalty over the bar.
Erling Haaland and Martin Ødegaard: Norway
Erling Haaland, the most in form player in the world along with Arsenal’s captain were not able to qualify for the tournament in Qatar this year. The Scandinavian team were not able to make it out of the group stage of the qualifying this time around, getting third by an agonizing 3 points.
Luis Díaz: Colombia
One of Liverpool’s stand out players in their disappointing start to the 2022/2023 season has been Luis Díaz, whose home country of Colombia did not qualify for the World Cup. Colombia were one point away from making it to the South American qualifying playoffs, but Díaz’s 3 goals in the qualifying stage were not enough to get his team through.
Zlatan Ibrahimović and Alexander Isak: Sweden
The 41 year old Swedish giant Zlatan, who has been in great form despite his age has missed out on possibly his last chance at World Cup glory after losing 2-0 in the qualifying finals against Poland. He wasn’t helping his team much though, with 0 goals in the qualifying process. Meanwhile, Newcastle’s new signing, Alexander Isak scored 4 times in qualifying (The most of any Swedish player), but even that could not bring their team to Qatar.
Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang: Gabon
Aubameyang’s Gabon team had a tough challenge in qualifying for the World Cup, to make it to the playoffs they would have to win their group, which happened to have Egypt, one of the world's top teams, and as expected, Egypt won the group with 14 points while Gabon got second place with a respectable 7 points.
Riyad Mahrez: Algeria
Algeria, a team looking for their fifth World Cup appearance made it to the playoffs of the African World Cup qualifying system and were able to win their 1st leg game 1-0 against Cameroon, but unlucky for the Manchester City player, Cameroon struck back in the second leg, winning 2-1 and thus beating Algeria on the tiebreaker of away goals.
David Alaba: Austria
Real Madrid’s player could not pull off the upset needed to get into the top two of a European qualifying group that contained powerhouses Denmark, Scotland, and Israel who all finished above Austria and the Faroe Islands plus Moldova, who finished below Alaba’s side.
Miguel Almirón: Paraguay
Almirón, Newcastle’s midfielder was unable to get Paraguay to the World Cup, which they haven't qualified for since the team’s best ever run in 2010 when Paraguay made it to the Quarter Finals. Almirón and his team finished in 7th, in the South American qualifying system in which a team must get 5th to have a chance at making it to the World Cup.
Naby Keita: Guinea
Guinea’s hopes for the World Cup were short lived as the team, containing Liverpool player Naby Keita only got 4 points in the group stage of qualifying, finishing 3rd in their group, while the 1st place in the group, Morocco, took 18 out of 18 possible points.
Jan Oblak: Slovenia
One of the greatest goalkeepers in the world did not make it to the tournament. Jan Oblak, Slovenia’s goalie let in 12 goals in 10 games and his team finished 4th in their group due to having a worse goal differential than Slovakia.
Giorgio Chiellini, Leonardo Bonucci, Jorginho, Gianluigi Donnarumma, Lorenzo Insigne, and Marco Verratti: Italy
One of the biggest upsets of the World Cup qualifying round was Italy, who won the Euros last year losing to North Macedonia, Italy had 32 shots while North Macedonia had 4, but one of those 4 was North Macedonian forward Aleksandar Trajkovski’s 92nd minute winner which eliminated Italy’s team in a 1-0 game.
Andy Robertson: Scotland
Andy Robertson, Liverpool’s starting left back lost to Ukraine in the playoffs to decide teams that will take the European slots in the World Cup, this was in a convincing attempt to captain the Scots to their first World Cup since 1998.
Oleksandr Zinchenko: Ukraine
Ukraine lost in the finals of the European qualification path against Wales, which meant that the Arsenal defender, one of the best players of the Premier League so far this season would be out of the 2022 edition of the tournament.
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