World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

[Kepler]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

Change in CONCACAF qualifying??

http://bigstory.ap.org/article/86ae...-overhaul-archaic-world-cup-qualifying-format

From that story:

to avoid shutting out the majority of countries in the CONCACAF region so early.

I only follow this casually but my understanding is that CONCACAF changed their qualifiers years ago to essentially ensure the US and Mexico would make the WC every time.

If Saint Kitts and Nevis can beat us after an even start to make the Cup, more power to them. We don't need to rig things further.

Edit: self-correction of poutrage. I somehow read that as "major" and not "majority of." The intent here is to get rid of the rigging. Carry on.

 

[Jimjamesak]

From that story:



I only follow this casually but my understanding is that CONCACAF changed their qualifiers years ago to essentially ensure the US and Mexico would make the WC every time.

If Saint Kitts and Nevis can beat us after an even start to make the Cup, more power to them. We don't need to rig things further.

Edit: self-correction of poutrage. I somehow read that as "major" and not "majority of." The intent here is to get rid of the rigging. Carry on.

No it was changed so there was at least some competitiveness in the Qualifying process by having the US, Mexico, Costa Rica etc. play each other.

If you take that away then CONCACAF Qualifying just becomes a big joke.

 

[Kepler]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

No it was changed so there was at least some competitiveness in the Qualifying process by having the US, Mexico, Costa Rica etc. play each other.

If you take that away then CONCACAF Qualifying just becomes a big joke.

I don't see why they don't just take all the CONCACAF teams and round robin them, and the top however many WC slots they get make it. If there are 8 islands nations and 4 minor countries and 2 major powers, so be it. Just don't use goal differential in the tie breaker to avoid 30-0 matches.

Or collapse CONCACAF into CONMEBAL, rank order however many teams (32?) that is by their FIFA ranking, home and home them 1-32, 2-31,... etc, and then round robin the surviving 16 and take the top, what 12? to the Cup. That would take care of the Sisters of the Poor countries.

 

[Jimjamesak]

I don't see why they don't just take all the CONCACAF teams and round robin them, and the top however many WC slots they get make it. If there are 8 islands nations and 4 minor countries and 2 major powers, so be it. Just don't use goal differential in the tie breaker to avoid 30-0 matches.

Or collapse CONCACAF into CONMEBAL, rank order however many teams (32?) that is by their FIFA ranking, home and home them 1-32, 2-31,... etc, and then round robin the surviving 16 and take the top, what 12? to the Cup. That would take care of the Sisters of the Poor countries.

Problem is you have to get 35 countries down to 3.5 slots. I guess you could do 7 groups of 5 but it would just turn Qualifying into a farce, a USA, Cuba, Saint Vincent, Bermuda, Cayman Islands group? Yawn.

Edit: CONCACAF is 35 countries for WCQ.

 

[Spartanforlife4]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

CONCACAF has 35 teams eligible for the World Cup.

If they go the Euro model, you end up with a group looking something like this:

USA
Jamaica
Cuba
El Salvador
Guyana
Montserrat
Barbados
Turks and Caicos
British Virgin Islands

 

[Stauber1]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

Yeah, I can appreciate the intent behind the suggestion, but there is just too much disparity between the teams.

If you have an opening round of group play to eliminate the bottom half, and then go to 3 groups of 5 or 6 and take the 3 group winners with the best 2nd place team in a play-off with another confederation, it's still going to be pretty ridiculous group play.

Even worse, they would offer little in the ways of preparation for the teams that do move through. Qualifying is the best preparation for competing in the World Cup. If you take away the opportunity for Mexico, the U.S. and Costa Rica to play competitive, meaningful games against each other they are going to be severely disadvantaged for the World Cup.

Obviously I don't think this is a good idea.

 

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

Yeah, I can appreciate the intent behind the suggestion, but there is just too much disparity between the teams.

If you have an opening round of group play to eliminate the bottom half, and then go to 3 groups of 5 or 6 and take the 3 group winners with the best 2nd place team in a play-off with another confederation, it's still going to be pretty ridiculous group play.

Even worse, they would offer little in the ways of preparation for the teams that do move through. Qualifying is the best preparation for competing in the World Cup. If you take away the opportunity for Mexico, the U.S. and Costa Rica to play competitive, meaningful games against each other they are going to be severely disadvantaged for the World Cup.

Obviously I don't think this is a good idea.

Maybe they need to do some groups starting with the bottom half of the confederation instead of the single head to head matchups?

 

[Stauber1]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

Maybe they need to do some groups starting with the bottom half of the confederation instead of the single head to head matchups?

That's what I was talking about.

From the comments in the articles it sounds what they want is more than 6 teams in the final stage, and the only way I can see that is if they have 3 (maybe 2) groups. I suppose they could go with one 10-team league like CONMEBOL, but I don't see that expanding the field the way they want and it still creates some completely lopsided games between the top 2 or 3 teams and the bottom 2 or 3 teams. So about the worst compromise possible.

It sounds to me like the idea is to have a qualifying more like UEFA, meaning multiple groups with the group winners advancing directly to the World Cup. And the only way to do that is to split up the top 3 teams among the groups, which would result in pretty much all the qualifying games for those teams being against substandard competition.

 

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

That's what I was talking about.

From the comments in the articles it sounds what they want is more than 6 teams in the final stage, and the only way I can see that is if they have 3 (maybe 2) groups. I suppose they could go with one 10-team league like CONMEBOL, but I don't see that expanding the field the way they want and it still creates some completely lopsided games between the top 2 or 3 teams and the bottom 2 or 3 teams. So about the worst compromise possible.

It sounds to me like the idea is to have a qualifying more like UEFA, meaning multiple groups with the group winners advancing directly to the World Cup. And the only way to do that is to split up the top 3 teams among the groups, which would result in pretty much all the qualifying games for those teams being against substandard competition.

If they remain at 3.5 spots, you could end with 2 hexagonal, winner advances, 2nd place plays a playoff with the other 2nd place for a spot of goes to the intercom federation playoff? I know they talked about this like 6 years ago but no one liked the idea of USA and Mexico not playing in qualifying...

 

[Stauber1]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

If they remain at 3.5 spots, you could end with 2 hexagonal, winner advances, 2nd place plays a playoff with the other 2nd place for a spot of goes to the intercom federation playoff? I know they talked about this like 6 years ago but no one liked the idea of USA and Mexico not playing in qualifying...

Exactly. The top teams would have maybe 1 other team in their group that offers any sort of test - so you enter the World Cup having played almost no meaningful games against quality competition. And you still have 2/3's the confederation out of qualifying in those final stages so I'm not sure how much it really addresses the issue they want to address. Seems like the worst possible compromise.

 

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

Exactly. The top teams would have maybe 1 other team in their group that offers any sort of test - so you enter the World Cup having played almost no meaningful games against quality competition. And you still have 2/3's the confederation out of qualifying in those final stages so I'm not sure how much it really addresses the issue they want to address. Seems like the worst possible compromise.

It would address the current problem by allowing countries like Suriname to participate in some kind of group stage which results in at least 3 home games. I know the reason they didn't do it was because of the lack of quality opponents to help with things. Maybe the answer is a bigger gold cup?

 

[Jimjamesak]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

I have to start by saying CONCACAF President Victor Montagliani is Canadian and head of the CSA. Guess which country would greatly benefit from an expanded Final Round of Qualifying?

That said, if the World Cup expands to 48 teams and CONCACAF adds maybe 2 berths then yes the format has to change.

But, in its current state, in the last 20 years only 10 countries have qualified for the Hex (USA, Mexico, Costa Rica, Honduras, T&T, Panama, Canada, Jamaica, El Salvador, Guatemala). Expanding the final round pretty much guarantees it'll be those 10 plus 2 randoms.

The main reason for two Gold Cups per cycle is to expand the number of meaningful games, via qualification, for the eliminated teams. Like was stated, an expanded Gold Cup to 16 teams may help (although some of those Group Stage games will be ugly).

 

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

So if you wanted to do dual hexes at the end with group winner guaranteed and 2nd place having a playoff, you could replace the first 4 rounds (12 match days) with 6 groups made up of the lowest 23 teams in the federation (5 groups of 4, 1 group of 3), top 2 in each group advance and get joined by the top 12 in the confederation for another 6 groups of 4 round robin. Top 2 advance to the final dual hexes. The only added dates would be adding the playoff for who gets the half spot/who gets the guaranteed spot.

 

[Jimjamesak]

So if you wanted to do dual hexes at the end with group winner guaranteed and 2nd place having a playoff, you could replace the first 4 rounds (12 match days) with 6 groups made up of the lowest 23 teams in the federation (5 groups of 4, 1 group of 3), top 2 in each group advance and get joined by the top 12 in the confederation for another 6 groups of 4 round robin. Top 2 advance to the final dual hexes. The only added dates would be adding the playoff for who gets the half spot/who gets the guaranteed spot.

I don't know. I can't get over the feeling this is being discussed because the President is Canadian and Canada got knocked out again.

 

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

I don't know. I can't get over the feeling this is being discussed because the President is Canadian and Canada got knocked out again.

I remember this being discussed back in 2014-15 for the qualifying for Russia, so its not like this is a new idea. It's hard not to see the CONCACAF qualifying as a bit archaic when you consider that 29 of the 35 teams are only guaranteed 2 games. I hate the idea of losing WC qualifiers between USA and Mexico, but the bottom teams deserve more games don't they?

You could also do hexes twice...all 35 teams get placed in to 6-team groups (1 group of 5), top 2 in each group play advance to be split in to 2 groups of 6.

 

[Jimjamesak]

I remember this being discussed back in 2014-15 for the qualifying for Russia, so its not like this is a new idea. It's hard not to see the CONCACAF qualifying as a bit archaic when you consider that 29 of the 35 teams are only guaranteed 2 games. I hate the idea of losing WC qualifiers between USA and Mexico, but the bottom teams deserve more games don't they?

You could also do hexes twice...all 35 teams get placed in to 6-team groups (1 group of 5), top 2 in each group play advance to be split in to 2 groups of 6.

I believe it was discussed around 2010 but that was all predicated on CONCACAF going to 4 full spots and abandoned when that didn't happen. What happened was an additional group stage was added prior to the semifinal round so teams could get more games and then abandoned for this round. Bringing that group stage back is honestly the best idea.

 

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

I believe it was discussed around 2010 but that was all predicated on CONCACAF going to 4 full spots and abandoned when that didn't happen. What happened was an additional group stage was added prior to the semifinal round so teams could get more games and then abandoned for this round. Bringing that group stage back is honestly the best idea.

The way they did it for the 2014 WC does make alot more sense than what they did this round. Only eliminating 5 teams on a home/home round. Then having 24 teams participate in 6 groups of 4 with each group winner advancing to semifinal.

*But that also requires 2 additional international dates compared to the 2018 setup, and doesnt address the fact that WC qualifying would still have eliminated all but 6 teams at this point.

 

[ExileOnDaytonStreet]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

You could also do hexes twice...all 35 teams get placed in to 6-team groups (1 group of 5), top 2 in each group play advance to be split in to 2 groups of 6.

This isn't terrible. Guarantees 10-12 games for each country compared to the current 2. Might be some issues in how you allocate berths to the two "final" hexes, though.

 

[Jimjamesak]

The way they did it for the 2014 WC does make alot more sense than what they did this round. Only eliminating 5 teams on a home/home round. Then having 24 teams participate in 6 groups of 4 with each group winner advancing to semifinal.

*But that also requires 2 additional international dates compared to the 2018 setup, and doesnt address the fact that WC qualifying would still have eliminated all but 6 teams at this point.

It's a better compromise to be honest.

It's just very difficult to expand anything on the back end of the Qualifying process. You can't expand the Hex because there's not enough dates to accommodate two more teams. You can't split the final stage because the US, Mexico, and Costa Rica won't be happy not playing each other.

The system isn't archaic like he described, it's actually a system that should be emulated by other Confederations (I'm looking at you Africa).

 

[Shirtless Guy]

Re: World Soccer XXVII: The REAL Football

I completely agree with the change needed for Africa. But I think that is a product limited budgets and the expanse of Africa.