good old predictable paraguay 😉
is there an argument for increasing the number of s. american teams in the world cup? i know they only have 9 in with a shout of getting to the finals but when was the last time they didn't win their fith place play off with another continent or not have at least 2 of the 3 teams other than brazil/argentina make the last 16?
Originally posted by trev33Trev, you can at least pat us on the back for that draw - it is really a win, no 78 vs no 1 - Great effort.
good old predictable paraguay 😉
is there an argument for increasing the number of s. american teams in the world cup? i know they only have 9 in with a shout of getting to the finals but when was the last time they didn't win their fith place play off with another continent or not have at least 2 of the 3 teams other than brazil/argentina make the last 16?
Originally posted by trev33I would like to see a points based system that determines the number of teams present from each confederation (regardless of performance in this world cup).
good old predictable paraguay 😉
is there an argument for increasing the number of s. american teams in the world cup? i know they only have 9 in with a shout of getting to the finals but when was the last time they didn't win their fith place play off with another continent or not have at least 2 of the 3 teams other than brazil/argentina make the last 16?
Originally posted by zm775yup, great draw.
Trev, you can at least pat us on the back for that draw - it is really a win, no 78 vs no 1 - Great effort.
france and italy final 4 years ago, 3 points from 4 games between them this year. looks like another draw will be good enough to see italy though to the second round though.
Originally posted by Palynkaau, i see what you're saying now. i'm not really sure the performance of a team say 12 years ago should have a bearing on how many teams qualify from a confederation... it works for the yearly cl and europa league but every 4 years? bit of a gap, just look at france and italy.
What do you mean? Something like the Champions League system where points per team are accumulated over a rolling window (with or without some bonus points for passing the groups/winning the whole thing). Adapted to the World Cup format, of course.
i see what you're saying though, i'd like to see some sort of change...
Originally posted by trev33The question is not if Italy and France are poor, but how many teams outside are better. France scraped in the playoffs so it's "representing" one of the least strong European teams in the World Cup.
au, i see what you're saying now. i'm not really sure the performance of a team say 12 years ago should have a bearing on how many teams qualify from a confederation... it works for the yearly cl and europa league but every 4 years? bit of a gap, just look at france and italy.
i see what you're saying though, i'd like to see some sort of change...
Italy and England disappointed their fans so far, but they still depend only on themselves. It's not over until it's over.
It would be a slow moving process, but that's ok in my book. The last World Cup was dominated by Europe with all semi-finalists being European and 6 out of 8 quarter-finalist being European. In the Last 16, 10 were European. Rising the number of SA teams based on this tournament alone could be a similar mistake to rising the number of European ones after 2006. But if the pattern continues over 3 tournaments...why not?
However, I would like to see clear rules for this, not some administrative based decision which will end up being about politics and revenue generation than football.
Originally posted by PalynkaI heard about this earlier. It's just bizarre.
In other news, the French implodes.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/2010/jun/20/world-cup-2010-france-training-ground-refuse-train
Maybe there's still time to replace them with Ireland? 😵
The French team waving the white flag. Crumbling from within. Anelka is refusing to discuss what really happened in the change rooms at half time in the Mexico game until after the French are out of the competition. Evra believes that there's a traitor in the team. Ribery is basically in tears over this mess.
England are in pieces and Capello is rather ridiculously putting all the blame on the players.
Spain are... I really don't understand this... putting blame on Casillas' girlfriend!
Such a strange World Cup. Some would argue that these poor performances are indicative of parity within world football but I don't know. It's not like the minnows are playing that much better than usual, it's that the top nations are playing surprisingly below their ability.
I wonder who Italy will blame for today's draw against the Kiwis.