Which nation’s travellers are the most gripped by World Cup Fever?

Data from ForwardKeys has shown which nations are travelling to Russia for the FIFA World Cup, and the results are somewhat surprising.

With just a week to go before the start of the tournament, ForwardKeys has looked at the uplift in visitor arrivals to Russia from June 4 to July 15, when World Cup ticket holders do not need a visa to enter the country.

The nation at the top of the list, with the greatest number of additional visitors, is the USA, which hasn’t even qualified for the finals.

It is followed, in order, by Brazil, Spain, Argentina, South Korea, Mexico, China, the UK, Germany and Egypt.

"This result may seem surprising because the USA has not qualified for the finals but interest in the spot has grown strongly since the 1994 World Cup when it was the host nation," said the company.

"Consequently, there will be nearly twice as many Americans in Russia during the World Cup as Brazilians. ForwardKeys believes that the reasons for the USA’s high placing also include the fact that it is the largest outbound travel market in the world and that it has a sizeable Latin segment in its population."

ForwardKeys also benchmarked countries them against the number of visitors that came to Russia during the same period last year.

Based on that method, Paraguay tops the list with over 52 times as many Paraguayans coming to Russia for the World Cup as visited in 2017.

Number two is Peru, which last qualified for the finals in 1982, followed by Panama, Nigeria, Tunisia, Bangladesh, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Colombia and Morocco. ~~

"One notable absentee from the top 50 list is Belgium," said ForwardKeys.

"The country has qualified for the World Cup but it is not showing up in either of the analyses. ForwardKeys’ explanation is the collapse of Vim Airlines, last autumn, which had a sizeable share of flights between Brussels and Russia so many Belgians are likely flying from neighbouring countries instead."

Olivier Jager, CEO ForwardKeys, added: "It is interesting to compare the different methods for assessing World Cup fever. On one approach, the list is headed by small countries, whose populations rarely visit Russia, so the uplift multiples of the top-ranked countries are enormous. However, the alternative approach tells you where the largest numbers of fans are coming from.

"Nevertheless, what I find fascinating is that whichever method one uses to assess World Cup fever, the top country is one that has not qualified for the finals. If anything, that illustrates the global appeal of football. My observation is that only four countries make the top 15 on both methods, Brazil, Egypt, Mexico and Peru so perhaps we should say they are the ones most gripped by World Cup Fever."