Jimjamesak
Already insane, UAA making it worse
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
DC United beats Real Salt Lake in the US Open Cup final.
DC United beats Real Salt Lake in the US Open Cup final.
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Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
Ozil has been huge, and Ramsey has gone from being a shadow of himself the last couple seasons after his horrific injury to being one of the best players in the EPL. I don't think a lot of people saw that coming. And Flamini signing on a free was a steal given how he is once again filling the defensive midfielder role. Sometimes things just all seem to click at once for a club. But, they're still very thin, with a number of important players out for awhile, so injuries could really deflate things. And it's worth noting that Arsenal's early season schedule is very light on the traditional EPL heavyweights. But, can't say I saw us sitting atop the EPL at this point, so I'll take it and hope for the best.
Ozil has been huge, and Ramsey has gone from being a shadow of himself the last couple seasons after his horrific injury to being one of the best players in the EPL. I don't think a lot of people saw that coming. And Flamini signing on a free was a steal given how he is once again filling the defensive midfielder role. Sometimes things just all seem to click at once for a club. But, they're still very thin, with a number of important players out for awhile, so injuries could really deflate things. And it's worth noting that Arsenal's early season schedule is very light on the traditional EPL heavyweights. But, can't say I saw us sitting atop the EPL at this point, so I'll take it and hope for the best.
Patman
Rodent of Unusual Size
So long as the caviar procurement isn't bothered, no appropriate cultured person should care (Harumph!)
RaceBoarder
Waiting for the Snow to fly...
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
What FIFA should do...l
Then again, that would apply that whole common sense thing...
What FIFA should do...l
Then again, that would apply that whole common sense thing...
P
Priceless
Guest
Jimjamesak
Already insane, UAA making it worse
Well that'll make people happy... Oh wait...
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
FIFA takes what makes sense and then does the opposite of that.
FIFA takes what makes sense and then does the opposite of that.
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
Not meaning to be trite but this is why the "tangled web" phase is accurate so often. I would suspect that Qatar didn't start off their bid with, "first, we get a bunch of slaves". But, FIFA awards a WC to a country without the proper stadium infrastructure because they bribe or influence the vote...that country has $$$$ but not enough workers to get it all done fast enough...so, they decide to 'import' workers. That could be done well, or poorly, and clearly the pressure of not being ready and/or not losing the bid due to the heat or other reasons suggests to the country that they need to work at breakneck pace to demonstrate the progress, commitment and investment...so they take the 'poorly' route and we get this result.
And it all started with a small group of dishonest people. As do most large, expensive mistakes.
Not meaning to be trite but this is why the "tangled web" phase is accurate so often. I would suspect that Qatar didn't start off their bid with, "first, we get a bunch of slaves". But, FIFA awards a WC to a country without the proper stadium infrastructure because they bribe or influence the vote...that country has $$$$ but not enough workers to get it all done fast enough...so, they decide to 'import' workers. That could be done well, or poorly, and clearly the pressure of not being ready and/or not losing the bid due to the heat or other reasons suggests to the country that they need to work at breakneck pace to demonstrate the progress, commitment and investment...so they take the 'poorly' route and we get this result.
And it all started with a small group of dishonest people. As do most large, expensive mistakes.
jmh
win or lose, we booze
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
Any more detail there? Pretty poor reporting IMO, especially given that the whole purpose of writing the article seemed to be to point out that the USA wasn't going to be a top 8 seed.
The "top seven plus hosts get seeds" thing seemed fairly obvious that it was going to happen. Toward the end they bury one line:
Any more detail there? Pretty poor reporting IMO, especially given that the whole purpose of writing the article seemed to be to point out that the USA wasn't going to be a top 8 seed.
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
With most organizations, you'd assume that they want to not have too many teams from any one federation in any one group, and that the stronger and weaker teams are relatively equally distributed. But this is FIFA, so it probably means that they intend to put the US in the Grupo del Morte.
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
You two should shut your **** dirty whoreish mouths. The Gods could hear you ya know!!
You two should shut your **** dirty whoreish mouths. The Gods could hear you ya know!!
Spartanforlife4
Generic Catchy Message
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
Looks like Group H in UEFA will come down to the final day.
Four teams still alive for first place, with England having to go up against Montenegro and Poland. I'm trying to decide if it would be incredibly awesome from a bragging stand point if Mexico and England don't make it, or lame because we'd have no rivals in the tournament.
Also, Iceland is decent position to at least make the playoff, and a small shot to win the group. Would be their first World Cup if they manage to make it.
Looks like Group H in UEFA will come down to the final day.
Four teams still alive for first place, with England having to go up against Montenegro and Poland. I'm trying to decide if it would be incredibly awesome from a bragging stand point if Mexico and England don't make it, or lame because we'd have no rivals in the tournament.
Also, Iceland is decent position to at least make the playoff, and a small shot to win the group. Would be their first World Cup if they manage to make it.
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
It wasn't at all obvious that they would use just the FIFA rankings, because it was reasonable to suppose that FIFA would prefer not to have Belgium and Colombia seeded.
One would assume that they'll do something like the past: Geographic pots with the geographic groupings determined by a combination of expediency and average strength.
It wasn't at all obvious that they would use just the FIFA rankings, because it was reasonable to suppose that FIFA would prefer not to have Belgium and Colombia seeded.
One would assume that they'll do something like the past: Geographic pots with the geographic groupings determined by a combination of expediency and average strength.
jmh
win or lose, we booze
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
Seems obvious to me because to do otherwise would be to admit that the FIFA rankings are flawed, and FIFA is loath to ever admit that they've been wrong about anything.
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
They used to use a composite of the FIFA rankings and past WC performance, and I think that would be a reasonable alternative that would not necessarily amount to an admission of flaws in the FIFA rankings—especially since it looks as though they went to the present system in the first place to avoid having France be seeded in the wake of the Henry handling scandal.
They used to use a composite of the FIFA rankings and past WC performance, and I think that would be a reasonable alternative that would not necessarily amount to an admission of flaws in the FIFA rankings—especially since it looks as though they went to the present system in the first place to avoid having France be seeded in the wake of the Henry handling scandal.
jmh
win or lose, we booze
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
Huh, I thought that they had previously used straight FIFA rankings, but I guess my recollection was off. I would tend to feel like in the deluded universe inside FIFA's collective brain where they don't realize that the FIFA rankings aren't all that good, it would in turn make internal logical sense just to use those rankings rather than fudge them further. In the real world, of course, we know that they'll fudge them to get a result they want, but I don't think there's anything "embarrassing", per se, about seeds going to teams that haven't been historically strong but are right now, like there was with the France thing.
Re: World Soccer XXIV: The Road to Rio
2002 and 2006 used a composite of prior World Cup performance and FIFA ranking snapshots to determine the seeds—the oddness in the results in 2002 (powers out in prelims or not qualifying, the U.S. making the quarters) and the FIFA ranking formula that was friendly to the U.S. led to us narrowly missing getting seeded for 2006. It was widely assumed that the same would be done for 2010, and the best guess for the reason for the change to just the FIFA rankings was that it was to deny France a seed. (It was a kind of poetic justice that France was drawn into the same group as the team that ended up with the seed they didn't get, which I think was the Netherlands.)
2002 and 2006 used a composite of prior World Cup performance and FIFA ranking snapshots to determine the seeds—the oddness in the results in 2002 (powers out in prelims or not qualifying, the U.S. making the quarters) and the FIFA ranking formula that was friendly to the U.S. led to us narrowly missing getting seeded for 2006. It was widely assumed that the same would be done for 2010, and the best guess for the reason for the change to just the FIFA rankings was that it was to deny France a seed. (It was a kind of poetic justice that France was drawn into the same group as the team that ended up with the seed they didn't get, which I think was the Netherlands.)
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