How many South American spots for Brazil 2014?
by Steve Davis on Jul 6, 2010 1:43 PM EDT
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PrintThe South American bus was motoring down Highway 2010 early in the tournament.
All five teams from South America (
Things didn’t go nearly so swell in the quarters, as we know, with only the Diego Forlan-driven Uruguayan express moving on.
Still, did
But
So, you can make the argument that
Whatever happens, it could well affect the
Probably. When is the last time a CONCACAF team moved into the quarterfinals without beating another team from the region in the Round of 16? Think about that for a second before you answer. Remember, the
El Tri has made it to the quarterfinals twice – but only in tournaments the Mexicans hosted, in 1970 and 1986.
So, if you subtract the significant advantages of home country edge, and subtract the instance of beating another CONCACAF side, it has NEVER happened in modern World Cups that a side from this region went through to the quarterfinals. That’s not good.
So, it wouldn’t surprise me if CONCACAF gets just three spots for Brazil 2014, with South America getting four plus
Of course, you could also argue against so much African representation, given how poorly six entrants did this year, with so much expected of them. So it is possible that
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Too many spots for Africa
There can be no doubt that Africa is overrepresented, given how poorly African teams compete in the finals. African has had at least five teams at the finals ever since the tournament was expanded to 32 teams in 1998. They have never had more than one team make it past the group stage.
by George Gorecki on Jul 6, 2010 1:48 PM EDT reply actions 2 recs
But it's a World Cup
Africa have 50 plus nations; Even now only 10% of teams get it.
A World Cup means that you’ll get weak sides. I personally don’t know what Honduras brought to the World Cup.
"We're investigating the investigative procedure of the investigation of Tony Bernazard"---Omar Minaya (he really didn't say it but he would"
by firejerrynow on Jul 11, 2010 7:42 AM EDT up reply actions
They Deserve It
I would say that South America deserves that extra spot. much life Africa getting an extra spot in this cup, the same should go for the next in South America. that allows many more ‘local’ fans to see the event in relative proximity to their homes.
makes sense, but the answers we get in life do not always make sense…
I agree, CONMEBOL should get an additional spot, to be taken away from CAF. But the bigger issue is the joke of a confederation that is OFC. New Zealand did have a respectable run this World Cup, but it’s a travesty that they qualified so easily. Especially with Australia now part of AFC, it’s hard to imagine any other Oceania team qualifying ahead of NZ.
"My face is my mask."
It's actually pretty easy for the 2014 tournament.
Obviously the results from CONMEBOL speak for themselves. One can hardly dispute that CONMEBOL should get an extra team in 2014. Fortunately, with Brazil as hosts, one could keep all of the allocations the same as 2010, and that would award one more team to CONMEBOL and one less to CAF.
It could be argued that CONCACAF deserves to lose their half-spot, which could be given to CAF (which would still be reducing their allocation by a half-spot). I have to admit that, if you compare them, Honduras and Costa Rica are probably worse than Nigeria and Egypt. (That’s the last qualifier and the playoff qualifier for CONCACAF vs. the qualifier with the lowest point total and the non-qualifier with the highest point total for CAF.)
It wouldn’t surprise me, though, if FIFA keeps all of the current allocations and just allows CONMEBOL to gain an extra spot by virtue of having the host country.
On a completely different note, though, I think it’s absolutely insane that a 10-nation confederation can legitimately lay claim to 6 world cup spots. CONMEBOL is to world football what the SEC is to college football.
Based on this year's results?
CONCACAF: 2/3 get to the KO, though neither makes the quarters.
CAF: 1/6 gets to the KO and reaches the quarters.
If anything, I’d think CAF would drop to 4.5 and CONCACAF gets a 4th full spot. (That could be the homer in me talking.) Giving CAF more spots doesn’t seem justified by recent results.
Has CAF EVER had more teams advance to the 2nd round than CONCACAF?
When’s the last time that happened? Despite them having had 2 more participants per year.
by Incipient_Senescence on Jul 6, 2010 10:14 PM EDT up reply actions
Never
They’ve gotten exactly one to the 2nd round every cup since 1986, none before. CONCACAF has had one every time since then as well, including three times with two (all three being the USA and Mexico, though one of the solo years was Costa Rica), and had three prior (1930, 1938, 1970).
Europe has more depth than South America
Yes Brazil and Argentina are in the most elite group of teams along with Germany and Italy.
But then Europe also has Spain, Holland, France, Portugal, England, Russia, Sweeden who tend to be consistently better than the other South American teams. The division of spots in the last 32 is about right now.
Los Angeles is like Manchester. There is a red team that wins championships and a blue team that doesn't.
Not sure I agree.
Europe has more teams than South America, but I’m not sure about top-to-bottom depth.
We’re saying that CONMEBOL can legitimately lay claim to 5.5 (call it 6) world cup spots. That means 60% of the countries in the federation could be going to the world cup.
UEFA, on the other hand, also has heavyweights, but they have 13 positions and 53 total teams in the federation, including the Faroe Islands, San Marino, and Liechtenstein. About 25% of the teams in UEFA will make it to the world cup, compared to 60% of CONMEBOL.
By sheer numbers, UEFA certainly has the better teams, but per capita, CONMEBOL has them squashed like a Central American team playing in the Copa America.
My point about the depth is that the teams from Europe that nearly made it: Russia, Croatia, Czech Republic, Sweden, Ireland, Bosnia, Turkey are probably better than Ecuador or Colombia.
The bottom teams like Malta and the Faroe Islands are not really relevant to this.
Los Angeles is like Manchester. There is a red team that wins championships and a blue team that doesn't.
Most of that has to do with the UEFA qualifying system being broken
And NOT how many slots a particular region should get.
The lack of deep seeding and the effect of having nations broken up into seperate simple single groups means that the “best” teams will often not qualify.
I am not a Supporter | I am not a Fan | I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart
Group draw is seeded all the way down for UEFA
Top 9 are all split, next 9 are split, etc. Two of the Pot A teams (top 9 in the Nov ’07 FIFA rankings among European teams; Czech Republic and Croatia) failed to qualify, and only one Pot B team (England, 10th among UEFA members) made it. Three qualifiers came from C (19-27: Serbia, Denmark, Switzerland), one from D (Slovakia), and one from E (Slovenia). The latter two both happened to draw into a group that was arguably spectacularly overrated by the FIFA rankings (Czech Republic, 4th among UEFA teams at draw time; Poland 16th; Northern Ireland 23rd).
Shouldn't CONCACAF be getting as many slots
as Asia and Africa
CONCACAF has been doing as well as them for the past three cups.
I am not a Supporter | I am not a Fan | I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart
It's about depth, not just top-level success.
Besides the U.S. and Mexico, name one team from CONCACAF that could qualify if competing in CAF or CONMEBOL. Each of those federations got 5 qualifying slots (not including the host nation), but I seriously doubt if any CONCACAF nation aside from the top 2 could even make a serious run at qualification in either of those venues.
CAF hasn’t had much World Cup success, but it has a lot of parity and competitiveness at a higher average level than is seen in CONCACAF.
Truth be known, CONCACAF really deserves about 2.5 slots in the World Cup. No CONCACAF team other than the U.S. or Mexico has ever advanced out of the group stage, and Honduras was scoring a major upset just to get 1 point in this tournament. Providing 2.5 slots would allow a team that’s truly worthy of a spot a chance to beat a good S. American or Asian team, and would still give 2 slots for the U.S. and Mexico.
That would seem fair to me, but everyone’s favorite corrupt millionaire football humanitarian Jack Warner has so much pull that CONCACAF will never lose any WC slots while he’s in charge.
Did bother to look at the pathetic the non-best that qualify from Asia are?
Or Africa?
All three non-premier conferences are top heavy and that’s it. The difference is that CONCAF earns a higher percentage of possible points than Asia and Africa.
I am not a Supporter | I am not a Fan | I am a Sounder
Sounder At Heart
Agreed
Honduras really outplayed Switzerland, and they definitely looked better than North Korea. I wouldn’t bet against them against Algeria (or maybe even Cameroon, this year) either.
by Incipient_Senescence on Jul 6, 2010 10:18 PM EDT up reply actions
CONMEBOL, no
But if North Korea can qualify in Asia, I’m damn sure Costa Rica or Honduras can. CAF would be a little trickier, but they’d at least be able to make a run.
No CONCACAF team other than the U.S. or Mexico has ever advanced out of the group stage
Costa Rica 1990. Also, in 1938 they didn’t have a group stage but Cuba won their first game in the knockout.
Not politically correct but the best soccer would result if
Europe gets 12 spots; Americas (South and North combined) 8; Africa 4; Middle East 4 and Asia 4.
Or as an even better alternative:
Europe 12; South america 6; and North America, Africa, Middle East and Asia competing freely for the remaining 14. Yes, that could result in a continent having no representation, which would create an outrage but it certainly would give us the highest quality World Cup.
I agree, but it depends on what you think "world" means
If the goal is to have the best 64 teams in the World, then your proposals are very interesting. But I don’t think anyone seriously believes it is FIFA’s intention. Besides, only maybe a quarter of the 64 teams have more than a icecube’s chance in hell of winning anyway.
I think it’s more about having the best from each PART of the world, so “world” in this case indicates representation more than class or quality.
The best on-field, strictly tactical soccer would result from changing the qualifications. But the spectacle of the World Cup, the off-field storylines and dramatic subtext, would suffer. As much as I didn’t think North Korea belonged in the Cup, their gutsy performance against Brazil and the players crying during their anthem lent importance and a sense of occasion that the game wouldn’t have had otherwise. And New Zealand certainly shocked a few people, and I even found myself rooting for them to advance out of their group. I just feel these things would be lost in a super-power tournament.
A good analogy is the NCAA basketball tournament, where a bunch of small college teams get their shot at glory. If they didn’t, the quality of play might be a little better but you’d miss those unforgettable moments of heroism.
I was hesitant before the cup to do that
But now it’s pretty clear that South America, at least this time around, had a lot of quality teams. Uruguay only got in by a playoff (that was tight)… AND were only one point ahead of Ecuador and Colombia, and two points ahead of Venezuela.
However, should this really be based on just this Cup? How do we know what CONMEBOL will give us in 4 years. Africa didn’t exactly represent at Africa’s World Cup.
4 years ago, Uruguay lost the playoff to Australia, and CONMEBOL only had 4 representatives. Three out of four CONMEBOL teams made it out of the first round, and two of the three making it to the quarterfinals, where they both fell.
2002, there were 5 teams from CONMEBOL (Uruguay beat Australia). But only Brazil and Paraguay made it out of the first round. Brazil won it all, while Paraguay was knocked out by Germany at the Round of 16.
1998, they got 4 teams direct plus the Cup holders Brazil (last time that was done). 4 out of 5 made it out of the first round (Colombia the lone failure), half fell at the Round of 16, Argentina at the Quarters, and Brazil in the final.
I’m going to stop there.
While this was a bit of an anomaly, it’s not that far outside the norm for CONMEBOL. To me, that makes it a stretch to suggest that they deserve 6 slots. But it certainly seems sensible to pull that 6th spot from CAF and pass it to CONMEBOL.
I like the idea of keeping the CONMEBOL/CONCACAF playoff as well. I don’t think it’s right to go slagging off Honduras for their performance. They were arguably hit with more injuries that just about any team in the tournament. If they had been healthy, things could’ve looked quite different.
It’s easy to say there are only two teams in CONCACAF, but not that long ago, the US was not one of those teams — the other team was Costa Rica. Who knows who that team will be 4 years from now. However, since it’s unlikely that the US or Mexico will falter badly enough to fail to qualify, it seems to go against the idea of a world tournament to limit CONCACAF to just a half chance for someone else. It would look like we were shutting out anyone else. As much as I dislike Warner’s cronyism, I do prefer that he do all he can to keep CONCACAF at 3.5. If that fourth team can beat someone from another confederation (preferably CONMEBOL), then they deserve to be at the big dance.
There's one big problem with his formula
UEFA can’t have as high a percentage of teams finish last because half the groups have two of them. They can’t both finish bottom of the table. Not sure what the right way to handle that is – maybe compute theirs out of 8 instead of 13 (in which case they would lose a half spot instead of CONCACAF). Or maybe add half the number of teams who finish 3rd to the last-place finishers.
There's another big problem
The insane amount of corruption at FIFA.
I'll eliminate you like I eliminate gluten from my diet.
by tehGrindCrusher on Jul 8, 2010 4:25 AM EDT up reply actions
That logic is completely ridiculous
If you don’t count the fact that Italy has never won a final against anything other than a European side in the World Cup Finals, they have never won a World Cup! Think about it!
I am still trying to even figure out why we have CONCACAF. Just merge all of the spots into one conference and the best eight play in the cup.
Same reason NCAA basketball has conferences and auto-bids
The number of teams involved is too large to do direct comparisons (round robin play would take a game every week from the end of one World Cup to the beginning of the next), or a basketball game every day from the end of the NCAA tourney to the beginning of the next year’s). If you’re going to split them, may as well do it on geographic lines for convenience. And they want each region to be represented.
I think this would make the U.S. a stronger side
Even though it might mean that we don’t qualify every time out. Still, I’m all in favor of it.
I'll eliminate you like I eliminate gluten from my diet.
by tehGrindCrusher on Jul 8, 2010 4:24 AM EDT up reply actions
If travel from Europe is bad now
how will the players like it when they have to fly to South America for qualifying?
Granted, this doesn’t seem to hurt the South American teams that much. But still, I think it’s completely unworkable.
Besides, there’s no way the two confederations would allow it. Definitely not Warner. He would lose too much power.
They will like it just fine
Because they will have no choice.
Is there much of a difference flying ny to la vs. Ny to rio anyway
But you are right. It will never be adopted because it makes too much sense.
by Cool Dudes on Jul 8, 2010 12:32 PM EDT via mobile up reply actions
There is a difference
About 8 hours worth of travel time distance.
by Nick Petrilli on Jul 9, 2010 3:42 AM EDT up reply actions
CONCACAF gets 3.5
CONMEBOL 4.5
and Brazil are hosts, while Africa goes back to 5.
It’s pretty simple.
"We're investigating the investigative procedure of the investigation of Tony Bernazard"---Omar Minaya (he really didn't say it but he would"
