The international qualifiers are where the real work starts for teams aiming to qualify for the World Cup. Each zone (AFC, CONCACAF and CONEMBOL) have a fixed number of automatic berths and a limited number of places for inter-confederation play-off winners to decide who makes it through to the final tournament.
The first round saw four of the lowest-ranked nations battle it out in two-legged ties. Anguilla and the British Virgin Islands were eliminated, while Turks and Caicos Islands and U.S. Virgin Islands were beaten on penalties.
In the second round, the 28 teams that remained were drawn into six groups of five, with the top two in each group qualifying for the next stage. Group winners and runners-up played single round-robin matches (two home and two away) to determine the three groups that progressed to the third round.
There were no surprises in the third round of qualification as Portugal and Greece topped their groups to qualify automatically for the finals, with the second-placed team going into the inter-confederation playoffs. Scotland are in Group C alongside Belarus and the winner of the Portugal v Denmark Nations League quarter-final, while Northern Ireland have been drawn in Group F with Slovakia, Hungary and the loser of the Germany v Denmark tie.
In South America, the top six automatically qualify and holders Argentina are well clear at the top of their group, with Colombia and Venezuela also safe in the other spots. Bolivia have a slim chance of crashing seventh, though they will need to win their remaining two matches (at altitude vs. Colombia and at home to Venezuela) while hoping that both Uruguay and Brazil can drop points in their final fixtures.