04/25/24
April 23, 2003
FIFA considers expanding 2006 World Cup Finals to 36 teams.: Mainly due to some heavy South American pressure after they lost a spot to Oceania.
posted by Ufez Jones to soccer at 02:32 PM - 10 comments
Increasing the number of teams by 4 makes it a much more complicated competition, you'd probably get: 1st round of 36 teams: 6 Groups of 6 with top 2 qualifying, OR, 12 groups of 3 with winner qualifying. 2nd round of 12 teams: 2 Groups of 6 with top 2 qualifying, OR, 4 groups of 3 with winners qualifying Semi-Finals Finals. I can't see it happening can you? Better to expand it to 64 teams and make it a classic cup competition.
posted by BigCalm at 04:46 PM on April 23, 2003
Better start queuing for your Australia versus Ecuador tickets now.
posted by Fat Buddha at 05:05 PM on April 23, 2003
Of course Beckenbauer will take more teams, just that much more $$$ for Germany's hotels, restaurants, and such, but I look at BC's speculation on structure and wonder how they make 36 teams fit. But by "class cup competition" do you mean knockout style, like the NCAA Dance?
posted by billsaysthis at 06:38 PM on April 23, 2003
This is bullshit! They better not, they keep fucking with the competition, pretty soon there are going to be timeouts and unlimited subs too! Shit...
posted by StarFucker at 08:31 PM on April 23, 2003
classic cup competition = knockout from start to finish (like the FA Cup). I have no idea what the NCAA Dance is!
posted by BigCalm at 03:31 AM on April 24, 2003
NCAA Dance = National Collegiate Athletics Association Men's Basketball Tournament. One loss oand you go home.
posted by billsaysthis at 01:29 PM on April 24, 2003
BC: Alternative competition structure ... 1st round: Six groups of six, top two from each group qualify plus four top third-placed teams overall. (I recall something weird like this happening back in the 80s when they had 24 teams; you couldn't break them into 8 groups of 3 or 3 groups of 8, and so, had to have six teams, which didn't result cleanly in an eight or sixteen qualifier list. So the qualification nuttiness occurred in said form.) 2nd round: 16 teams in single-leg knockout. (I just can't see another round of group play.) Quarterfinals Semis 3rd-place game Final
posted by worldcup2002 at 03:12 PM on April 24, 2003
The trouble with changing the world cup structure is that the world cup has to fit into a month, and even now, that still means seven games in a month for the finalists (and maybe seven games in three weeks, depending on when your first games is). Any more games, and the quality would just go to shit (even more so than currently).
posted by dng at 01:07 PM on April 29, 2003
Yeah, 36 does push at the boundaries of maintaining match quality. Esp. when you consider the top players have all been through gruelling domestic and Euro league and cup competition (as well as qualifiers) by the time they get to the World Cup. Probably goes some way to explaining the poor performances of France, Argentina and Portugal at last year's competition. We should stop at 32.
posted by worldcup2002 at 02:38 PM on April 29, 2003
Jesus, no! I already have to take the best part of a month off work to watch it.