mattbin Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 Not sure how Canada's affected. I don't think it's as good for us as it is for, say, T&T. http://sports.yahoo.com/sow/news?slug=ap-wcupqualifying-concacaf&prov=ap&type=lgns U.S. to start World Cup qualifying in June By RONALD BLUM, AP Sports Writer October 31, 2003 NEW YORK (AP) -- The United States will start World Cup qualifying in June under a revised format created by soccer's governing body for North and Central America and the Caribbean. In the plan originally adopted by CONCACAF in February, the Americans could have begun as early as Jan. 17 and played up to 20 games. Under the new formula submitted to FIFA on Wednesday, the U.S. team will play 18 games starting June 12 or 13. ``We heard from a number of nations, be them large and small, who had issues with the first round,'' Chuck Blazer, CONCACAF's secretary general,m said Friday. ``The dates we had in January were not FIFA-approved international game dates. We listened to the members and came up with the new recommendation.'' The original plan eliminated all first-round byes. Under the new format, 20 Caribbean nations will play home-and-home, total-goals series in the Caribbean portion of the preliminary round, with games Feb. 18 and March 31 The 10 winners will advance along with Belize and Nicaragua to the mixed-zones portion of the round, and those 12 nations will play home-and-home series against the 12 teams that made it in the semifinals of qualifying for the 2002 World Cup, among them the United States. Those games will be played June 12-13 and June 19-20. The 12 survivors are divided into three semifinal groups, and each team will play six games from Aug. 18 to Nov. 17. The top two teams in each group advance to the finals, to be played from Feb. 9 to Oct. 12, 2005. In the finals, the first three teams qualify for the 32-nation field at the 2006 tournament in Germany and the No. 4 team advances to a playoff against a team from another region, possibly the No. 4 team from Asia. CONCACAF's proposal must be approved by its executive committee, which meets Tuesday in Miami, and by FIFA's executive committee, which meets in Frankfurt, Germany, on Dec. 3, two days before the World Cup draw. Also Friday, Blazer and the U.S. Soccer Federation said the United States had turned down an invitation to play in next summer's Copa America, the championship of South America. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crazy_Yank Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 The way it has been done for the last world cups was the best. "If it aint broke don't fix it." Oh well, as long as the final round stays as a single table concacaf will be fine. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sstackho Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 This means a team like Canada could be out of WC2006 after playing only two qualifying matches (like could have happened IN WCQ2002). So don't have an injury! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sstackho Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 This means a team like Canada could be out of WC2006 after playing only two qualifying matches (like could have happened IN WCQ2002). So don't have an injury! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ed Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 quote:Originally posted by sstackho This means a team like Canada could be out of WC2006 after playing only two qualifying matches. So don't have an injury! No different than last time, when we squeaked by Cuba 1-0 in a home and home series. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ed Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 quote:Originally posted by sstackho This means a team like Canada could be out of WC2006 after playing only two qualifying matches. So don't have an injury! No different than last time, when we squeaked by Cuba 1-0 in a home and home series. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sstackho Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 Heh, Ed, you read my mind before I could edit it myself... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sstackho Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 Heh, Ed, you read my mind before I could edit it myself... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 Wow. Well I guess we hope we don't get Haiti or Cuba. This makes more sense that the orginal format (IMO), but the two-leg playoff is pretty dicey. At the same time those 13-24 nations shouldn't be difficult. And two of the 12 pools originally were only going to have two teams. So there was a chance we were in for a home-and-home anyway. So we don't start until the summer then? Damn and I was saving a weeks holiday to carry over for Feb in the tropics. cheers, mathew Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sstackho Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 I, too, was looking forward to some competitive matches in January, but if those weren't even FIFA international match dates, then I guess this qualifying method makes more sense. I suppose with our coach situation, this also bodes well. Hopefully we can keep up the pace of friendlies in early 2003. BTW, I believe only one of the groups in the initial proposed format was to have two teams... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sstackho Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 A reminder (for me, mainly) of the 12 semifinal teams. So we could play against any CONCACAF nation that is not one of: Trinidad and Tobago Mexico Panama Honduras Jamaica El Salvador St Vincent / Grenadines USA Guatemala Costa Rica Barbados Considering Canada's performance in the semifinal round, we probably wouldn't want any seedings to decide the match-ups of this new qualification format. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gian-Luca Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 I still don't like it. The format only saves us two games to play that would have been gimmies in any event. Its ridiculous that they are changing things at the last minute (though I hated the previous format) and ridiculous that it is possible for quality teams in the region to be eliminated quite flukily after just 2 games 2 years before the bloody World Cup is even played. On the tail end you have 4 teams out of the final 6 advancing to either the World Cup or a final play-off, after playing each other for an entire year. Too much room for error in the final round, no room for error (or biased officiating, etc.) in the first round (for the 12 seeded teams). I don't think we will be cursed with a 2 & out 1990-style qualifying effort again, but its annoying that we (or any of the other better teams in Concacaf) have to even risk it. This would give a new coach more time to get to know the team however, and all conflicts with Olympic qualifying should now be over. That and the saving of two trips across the Atlantic for our European players are about the only positives that would come from this decision. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dave Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 I like this format better than last time around. Of the unseeded 24 teams we might play, only Cuba, Haiti, and maybe Nicaragua worry me at all. So we have a 75% chance of drawing a really easy opponent in round 1. Whereas in 2000 we had to play Cuba in that round. So this is an improvement. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Ed Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 I wish you'd quit calling us one of 'the better teams in Concacaf'. The fact that you are worried about playing some tiny Caribbean island in a home and away contradicts that sentiment. No offense Gian-Luca, but you seem to be a 'half-full' kind of guy when it comes to our men's team. As I said before, the fluke win of the Gold Cup in 2000 was a long time ago. Rock bottom is not far away, but that's where we're headed with the clowns at the CSA in charge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dave Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 Forgot to mention... this format is also better than the 3 team groups, since with the old proposed system we could have drawn, say, Haiti and US Virgin Islands. Then if we split our two games with Haiti, it would come down to who beat USVI by a bigger margin, and if the last game is Haiti vs USVI, you just know that Haiti will pump 50 goals in to eliminate us on goal differential. With two-team groups, at least if we draw Haiti they have to actually beat us head to head to eliminate us, none of this "score a bunch of cheapies against the minnow" BS. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dave Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 Hey Ed, in G-L's defence, remember he's an attorney, it's his job to think in terms of worst case scenarios! Kidding Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gian-Luca Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 quote:Originally posted by Ed I wish you'd quit calling us one of 'the better teams in Concacaf'. The fact that you are worried about playing some tiny Caribbean island in a home and away contradicts that sentiment. No offense Gian-Luca, but you seem to be a 'half-full' kind of guy when it comes to our men's team. As I said before, the fluke win of the Gold Cup in 2000 was a long time ago. Rock bottom is not far away, but that's where we're headed with the clowns at the CSA in charge. No offense taken - I am a half-full kind of guy, and make no apologies for it. That's not to say I'm not also concerned with the direction the team has been taking since Holger left (and I wasn't one of the ones pushing for Holger's dismissal precisely because I wasn't sure what direction a new coach would take us in - however I'll keep an open mind about what ultimate direction we take until we know for sure who the new coach is). How far down the ladder we are from the likes of the US, Mexico is up for debate, but out of the 35 teams in the region I'd still have to say that we are one of the better ones. Whether you cast us in the top 6, 8, 10 or 12 doesn't really change the meaning of that term the way I am trying to use it (though I actually used "quality teams" in this instance). For greater clarification, when I say being one of the "better" teams it doesn't necessarily mean being in the top 2 or 3. By the way, is Costa Rica considered one of the better teams in Concacaf? They lost to one of those tiny Carribbean islands (Barbados) last time round in qualifying & yet were an open-net miss away from making it to the 2nd round of the World Cup in a group that included the 1st & 3rd place finishers. Flukes can happen, and not just to us, especially when you have the lack of quality that comes with Concacaf officiating. As I was alluding to in my previous post, that doesn't mean that I am "worried" that we will lose, I just think the risk of fluke is unnecessary and would prefer to see it eliminated. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Dave Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 Exactly. It is all too easy to go down due to referee bias/incompetence, player injury, or just bad luck. Not sure what the answer is. But we just aren't like UEFA. Too many teams and too few WC spots. I'm not sure how this fundamental problem could be resolved. I suppose the first round could be eight groups of 4 or 5, top two qualify, then a second round of four groups of 4, top two qualify, then a final round of two groups of four... same total number of games with minimization of flukes... hey maybe it isn't so hard to resolve this Too bad Jack and Chuckie never seem to quite get it right [xx(] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gian-Luca Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 I would have gone with 4 groups of 4 leading to a final round of 8 teams - perhaps starting the process when the South Americans or Africans did to give us the necessary time for the two extra games that would need to be played under this system. The minnows would battle each other & the top 4 minnows making the 4 groups of 4, two group winners in each group making the final round of 8. 14 games in the final round, 6 in the semi-final - 20 matches overall for all of the non-minnows, the same number that Concacaf was proposing to begin with. Apart from the opening round, I don't like the way the final round is set up with only 2 of the 6 teams in the final round being eliminated out-right. Sort of reminds me of the days when the NHL would play 80 games just to eliminate 5 teams out of 21. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 quote:Originally posted by sstackho [brBTW, I believe only one of the groups in the initial proposed format was to have two teams... That's true, but Antigua was kicked out of Olympic and World Cup qualifying (though they may get to appeal) and that reduced the number of teams and therefore the number of three team groups. I'm assuming they will remain suspended, because if you include Antigua you have 21 teams in the Carribean. If they're suspended, then you have the 20 you need to playoff in the first round to join Belize and Nicaragua in the 'mixed-zone'. I like the hex because it pretty much guarantees that the top teams go through. I agree that the semifinals are less forgiving than the Hex. At the same time we'd have to battle through a draw at some point. Whether it be two final pools or three semifinal groups, there's a chance of a really tough draw. This is WCQ it isn't supposed to be easy. And when we don't make it to the Hex we can't expect the next go round to give us any favours. I understand why people don't like the two-game format, but frankly if we can't beat Cuba or Haiti (or teams significantly worse than them) over two legs, what would happen to us in the World Cup? I know our form this summer will be much different from our form in 2006, so what. WCQ takes a long time, just ask CONMEBOL. The point of this is to get rid of the pretenders in less than four games and let the real teams get down to it in a long and fairly equitable system. If we can't win a home and away against a minnow, then frankly we're pretenders and we wouldn't have survived the SF round anyway. I know we could get a monsoon, or a bad call or three or injuries, etc. That could happen at any time. We need to make our own breaks and not have a bunch of ready made excuses handy when we fail. The handball non-call against T&T last time. The Honduran dive that got them a PK in 94. The offside call against Mexico in 94, bad breaks bite you in the butt all the time in qualifying. I don't believe a bad call determines an entire qualification very often. If a bad call means we can't beat the Cayman Islands, then what does that say about us? This format is equal for all of the dozen seeded nations (which is a step up from 2002) and I imagine it will be what we get to deal with. Let's get ready to get it on. cheers, matthew P.S. Home leg likely in Edmonton? Or would they pick somewhere smaller? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 Dave your format proposes a maximum of 26 games to qualify (for the two second-place teams that would have to square off for third and fourth, the fourth place team would then have two more games in the playoff). So there are significantly more games in your proposal than in the current one. I like G-L's 4x4 the octagonal, but how do you get to a 4x4? Are you proposing giving all 12 semifinal teams a bye to the next semifinal? That's putting a lot of stock on 2002 qualifying. I'd be pretty chocked if I were Cuban and had to go through a multi-round qualifying process just to get to the sf, just because we lost to Barbados on penalty kicks four years ago. That's just devil's advocate, because I think your system probably makes more sense than the one we're getting, but one those so heavily benefits 12 nations and hurts the other 22+ will have a lot of TFC nations mad. Bottom line is I think this system is better than the one we had yesterday and I'm cool with that. cheers, matthew Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ditty Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 Can't help but think we are going to need a big squad for qualifying if we hope to make it to the last round of 6. I hope we get a look at some of the Scandanavian based players in these next two friendlies. As well, we may end up being quite dependent on our N.A. based players. We may not have seen the last of Watson, et al. I'd like to dig out a calendar and see how many games a European-based player will miss if he plays in all of our qualifiers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gian-Luca Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 quote:Originally posted by matthew I like G-L's 4x4 the octagonal, but how do you get to a 4x4? Are you proposing giving all 12 semifinal teams a bye to the next semifinal? That's putting a lot of stock on 2002 qualifying. cheers, matthew It is putting a lot of stock into it, but the system that is going to be used also does that - the 12 teams are still getting a bye into a later round & don't have to face each other until then. My system just pushes it on into a later round, but one that includes a larger group of teams. Of course, it doesn't have to be that you go solely on the most recent WCQ result. In fact I'd argue that it shouldn't be that way. You could do what UEFA & FIFA do with their rankings of teams & go by the past several attempts to qualify, placings in the Gold Cups, Olympic qualifying etc. As well, the "battle of the minnows" doesn't necessarily have to be a lengthy process to get 4 of them into the 4 x 4 semi-final. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew Posted October 31, 2003 Share Posted October 31, 2003 quote:Originally posted by Gian-Luca As well, the "battle of the minnows" doesn't necessarily have to be a lengthy process to get 4 of them into the 4 x 4 semi-final. It's lengthier than a home-and-home, no matter what format you use. cheers, matthew Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gian-Luca Posted November 1, 2003 Share Posted November 1, 2003 quote:Originally posted by matthew It's lengthier than a home-and-home, no matter what format you use. cheers, matthew True, but by far the lesser of all the possible evils, IMO. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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