Brazil intimidated their opponents. They played some great football today. While playing football in the match, they almost did samba at the same time. They showed that they are one of the strongest favorites for the cup. They passed the last 16 round very comfortably and the same will probably happen in the quarterfinals. If they match with Argentina in the semifinals, it is not difficult for them to reach the final by eliminating them. Because they play better football than Argentina.
I think the winner of the England-France match with Brazil will meet in the final. But it would be a little difficult to know who will win the final
After watching all the teams play at least two games I am still confident that Brazil is going to win this year. Their team plays so well together and it feels like they are on a different level. Winning against Croatia should be no issue. In the semi finals they will probably meet Argentina which is going to be a cool match. The two countries are huge rivals all Brazil will give everything to win. So Brazil reaching the finals seems the most likely to me right now. For the other leg I also think it's going to be the winner out of the France - England match, which is likely going to be France. Both Spain and Portugal played well so far and will likely meet each other, another great rivalry which should be a nice match to watch. But both of them would likely lose against France in the semi finals. So my earlier pick for the finals is still the same: Brazil vs France, and Brazil winning the tournament.
I also think that Brazil will win this World Cup, at least I have no doubt that they will beat Croatia in 1/4 and will play in the semi-finals... Only very often it happens that the most interesting matches are the semi-finals... I would like to see France and Brazil play in the final, but it could happen that they will meet before that... If they do, it's hard for me to name a winner in this match...
I agree that so far Brazil and France have shown the most at this World Cup, but that is no guarantee that they will play in the final.
At this world championship, we have already seen a lot of unexpected results, and big representatives such as Germany, Belgium, Uruguay or Denmark did not even manage to make it to the knockout stage of the competition.
Brazil has a lot of problems when playing against well-organized teams with a strong defense, such as Switzerland or Cameroon, and that's why the match against Croatia will be very difficult for them.
Croatia has already shown at this world championship that they win even when the opponent plays better, which is a characteristic of top teams.