The claim: “Some teams are specialists in deciding late.”
No team decides late more than chance explains.
With few goals, any team can look like a specialist. Once each team's number of goals is taken into account, all of them fit the expected range.
VerdictMyth
Goals scored from the 76th minute
Each dot is a team. Dashed lines: the 95% and 99.8% limits for its number of goals.
Goals conceded from the 76th minute
No team is outside even the 95% limit.
What it means
0teams outside the 99.8% limit, for late goals scored or conceded.
2outside the 95% limit: Austria (6 of 11 goals late) and Iran (7 of 14). With this many teams, chance alone puts a few there.
25%of all their goals come from the 76th minute on. That is the chart's yardstick.
How we know
- Base
- the 48 teams with at least 10 World Cup matches from 1986 to 2026; regulation goals, scored and conceded.
- Late
- from the 76th minute to the end of second-half stoppage time; extra time excluded.
- The limits
- the range an ordinary team with the same number of goals would fall in. Teams with few goals swing more, so the range opens up to the left.
- Rule, written before looking at the data
- the claim would be true if any team fell outside the 99.8% limit. None did. Myth.