Well , for me , this will be the first World Cup that will be held during the Winter and I must say that it will be an unique experience for almost everyone as Fifa is doing this for first time. Now ...favorites ? Well, you might find this funny or not true but I don't like Messi at all but I support Argentina national whenever they play with Messi becoming my favorite haha. Why ? Well I think it all started when I was young and won on Fifa 2004 a local tournament with players a lot more experienced and older than me and got around 20 euro and gave it to my mom ...it was all due to Argentina massive team even since then so yea , my favorite will always be Argentina when they play World Cup.
It true that this World Cup will kick off in November in Qatar. AFAIK, the winter in Gulf countries are never extreme. You cant say winter in Qatar are as extreme as they are in Europe or rest of the world. We can say it will be a moderate temperature in November. I too siding with Argentina ever since I started following football, prime reason is there versatile playing strategy aka short passes.