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World Cup Draw Friday

matthew

By matthew
in Men's National Teams

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matthew Newbie

matthew

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The road to glory will be mapped out starting Friday morning at the Frankfurt Festival Hall. The first ball will be pulled at 11:05 a.m. eastern (10:05 a.m. Moose Jaw standard time), which is 5:05 p.m. Central European time (I think I have that time adjustment correct, but I've been wrong before). It is scheduled to conclude at 12:45 p.m. eastern.

Two famous names will draw the names for each confederaion (except CONMEBOL who's in a big hurry and already started. Not that there's any point in drawing for them anyway).

The first draw conducted will be for the Asian zone, followed by Oceania, CONCACAF, Africa and finally Europe.

There is supposed to be live coverage of this, but we all know there won't be (in fact I'd be strangely pissed if we get to watch Pierluigi Collina pull balls and yuck it up with Blatter and not get to see the U20s). Any of our European bretheren feel like filling us in on all of the excitement.

Do we know if this will just determine our minnow or if it will show the entire shining path? Could be a fascinating day. Or maybe I'm just a big geek.

cheers,

matthew

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beachesl Community Regular

beachesl

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quote:Originally posted by matthew

Do we know if this will just determine our minnow or if it will show the entire shining path? Could be a fascinating day. Or maybe I'm just a big geek.

Don't think anyone knows for sure. The meeting in Frankfurt tomorrow (Wed>) is supposed to hammer out and settle all qualifying format and schedule issues. I expect that all issues, (including, I expect, the second round for CONCACACAF tentative groups and schedule) and the half-spot qualifying playoffs in November, 2001. Don't know if they'll announce their decisions tomorrow, or whether they will wait until Friday and announce the process prior to the draw then.

The latest announcement from CONCACAF has set out how the draw (and full schedule)is to be made for the qualification rounds, but does NOT specify whether the second round draw (3 Groups of Four, Aug-Nov. 2004) will also be made on Friday:

http://www.concacaf.com/view_article.asp?id=2315

I expect that on Friday our shining path will be shown to look something like the following format (not predicting the teams):

"Intra-Carribean Round" (Feb 18, March 31)

Cayman Islands v. Cuba

(plus nine other series)

"Mixed Zones Round" (June 12-13, 19-20)

CaymanIslands/Cuba winner v. Canada

(plus eleven other series)

"Semi-Final Round" (Aug.-Nov, 2004)

Group A

Dominica/Haiti v. USA (Pot A) winner

Anguilla/Bermuda v. Honduras (Pot B) winner

CaymanIslands/Cuba winner v. Canada (Pot C) winner

TurksandCaicosIslands/Surniame winner v. El Salvador (Pot C) winner

(plus two other groups)

"Final Round" , aka the Hex, (Feb.-Oct 2005)

Group fo Six , top two from each second round group,

top three to automatically qualify, fourth to playoff

in Novemebr 2005, against....(whatever format is announced)

You get the idea[:o)]

The diffficulty with drawing for the Second Round now is that there could be misbalanced groups if there are upsets, but I think that will be overuled by the desire to get all the drawing done for 2 years.

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matthew Newbie

matthew

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quote:Originally posted by beachesl

Don't assume that we get a minnow for the preliminary round. We could

get Cuba or Haiti, and be in danger of premature emasculation by June.

I know we could get Haiti or Cuba. I stand by my minnow comment. They're not bad teams, but they're not teams anyone with pretences of going to the Hex should even consider losing to.

cheers,

matthew

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Gordon Newbie

Gordon

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quote:Originally posted by matthew

I know we could get Haiti or Cuba. I stand by my minnow comment. They're not bad teams, but they're not teams anyone with pretences of going to the Hex should even consider losing to.

cheers,

matthew

Well said.

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matthew Newbie

matthew

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quote:Originally posted by hamiltonfan

what do you say that chances are for us to go all the way to the world cup 7/10?? 8/10

I'd go slightly less than 50-50, maybe 4.5/10. World Cup qualifying is a journey and a process. I don't think we can get too far ahead of ourselves. Our odds could be much better in two years, or much worse. They will almost certainly be different. The draw could make a big difference.

For 02 I would have said our odds were pretty good, but once our SF draw looked like Mexico, T&T and Honduras (remember Panama actually finished ahead of Honduras in their opening pool) I thought our odds got longer.

cheers,

matthew

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matthew Newbie

matthew

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quote:Originally posted by hamiltonfan

what do you say that chances are for us to go all the way to the world cup 7/10?? 8/10

I'd go slightly less than 50-50, maybe 4.5/10. World Cup qualifying is a journey and a process. I don't think we can get too far ahead of ourselves. Our odds could be much better in two years, or much worse. They will almost certainly be different. The draw could make a big difference.

For 02 I would have said our odds were pretty good, but once our SF draw looked like Mexico, T&T and Honduras (remember Panama actually finished ahead of Honduras in their opening pool) I thought our odds got longer.

cheers,

matthew

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Guest Dave

Guest Dave

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I'll be able to estimate our WCQ odds after I See the draw.

For now, without knowing the draw, I suppose I would put our qualifying odds at around 35-40%

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Gian-Luca Grand Master

Gian-Luca

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quote:Originally posted by matthew

I'd go slightly less than 50-50, maybe 4.5/10. World Cup qualifying is a journey and a process. I don't think we can get too far ahead of ourselves. Our odds could be much better in two years, or much worse. They will almost certainly be different. The draw could make a big difference.

Agreed, it is a tough question to answer at this stage. A couple of factors over the next two weeks or so may make an answer easier.

1.The half-spot - if the team that gets the half-spot from Concacaf faces off against the 5th place South American team, I like our chances (or any other Concacaf team's) less than I would if it were the Oceania or 5th place Asian team (especially that one). If it ends up being a 4-team round robin with two going ahead, then that is not as bad.

2.More importantly than #1 (which might not even come into play) is the new coach. If Yallop is hired & he is able to ensure that we use the best players from all of our player pool (with no exiles) as well as improving the team chemistry & organization on the field, I'd be willing to say 60-40. I'd like to think that this isn't such a big "if", that if every person who follows the Canadian team can agree almost unanimously that Hastings should not be a regular starter at left back ahead of Jazic, and that Julian De Guzman should be starting in midfield, rather than not called up at all like in the Finland match, or that Nick Dasovic should finally be allowed to retire to make room for the bevy of more-than-capable midfielders that can take his place, that a new coach should also be able to figure this out quite easily. Call me an optimist, but there you are.

If it were based on talent-only with a decent coach, I'd put Canada's chances at even higher, perhaps 65-35 or even 70 - 30, but idealism aside the fact is the team has to get used to each other and while we are seeing a bit of that up front & in midfield, this is still a disadvantage in comparison to most other Concacaf teams with a shot at qualifying. Add to that our depth isn't being as much as the other teams, meaning that injuries should affect us more adversely than many of our competitors and thus I have to reduce our chances somewhat.

By comparison the Mexicans & Americans probably have a 90-10 chance in favour of qualifying with the 3.5 spots, especially with one team having Azteca & the othe other having a lot more $$$ than we do, not to mention the overall depth & talent level that their respective leagues provide. Costa Rica have the talent & Steve Sampson, whereas Honduras are inconsistent and have not set the world alight yet under Bora Multinovic.

Jamaica I think would be the other big threat for one of the top 4 spots, moreso than T&T or Guatemala. El Salvador, Haiti, Panama & Cuba probably round out the contenders for the Hex, but it is difficult to see them coming close to a qualifying spot should they even get there.

A couple of other things to keep in mind for Canada. The results in themselves have been largely disappointing the past two years, but some of the actual play has been encouraging. We've always known that Canada is capable of playing poorly at times, but what has been exciting is seeing Canada capable of playing better soccer they have befoer. We've not ever had the ability to take the game to decent European opposition in their own parks before & actually play some possession soccer against them.

As well, for qualifying we will have a new advantage that we will not have had for 4 years - home-field. Given that we've not had a full squad for a match since about 1997 and that we've not played at home since 2000, I'll go out on a limb & suggest that we have not seen the true potential of the Canadian team. We know we will get the home dates for qualifying, we have to ensure that we get a full squad as well. I can't stress that point enough.

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MikeD Newbie

MikeD

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I just had a look at the draw procedures on the CONCACAF website (thanks for posting it, beachesl). Here's what it says about the seedings:

*****

The CONCACAF World Cup qualifying draw will have the 34 nations placed into the following six pots:

Pot A: Costa Rica, Mexico, USA (Teams that qualified for the 2002 FIFA World Cup)

Pot B: Honduras, Jamaica, Trinidad & Tobago (Teams that reached the final round of CONCACAF qualification for 2002 FIFA World Cup)

Pot C: Barbados, Canada, El Salvador, Guatemala, Panama, St. Vincent & The Grenadines (Teams that reached the semifinal round of CONCACAF qualification for 2002 FIFA World Cup)

Pot D: Belize, Nicaragua (Remaining teams from Central America)

Pot E: Antigua & Barbuda, Bermuda, Bahamas, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Haiti, St. Lucia, St. Kitts & Nevis, Suriname (Two remaining teams from North Zone and top eight from Caribbean from the FIFA World Cup Rankings through 22 October 2003)

Pot F: Anguilla, Aruba, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, Dominica, Guyana, Montserrat, Netherlands Antilles, Turks & Caicos Islands, US Virgin Islands (Remaining teams from the Caribbean Zone and from the bottom of FIFA World Cup Ranking through 22 October 2003)

All twenty teams will be drawn from the Pots E and F and divided into ten groups of two to play home and away series to produce ten qualifiers. These teams will then be joined by the 14 teams that received first round byes from the remaining Pots (A, B, C, D). These 24 teams will be divided into 12 groups of two to play home and away with the second round series winners advancing to the semifinal stage.

*****

Based on this, plus the Neil Davidson article, it looks like each semi-final group will have:

1) a Pot A team (or their second-round opponent, in the event of an upset)

2) a Pot B team (or their second-round opponent, in the event of an upset)

3) two Pot C teams (or their second-round opponents, yadda yadda yadda)

Canada's second round opponent could consist of a Pot D team (Belize or Nicaragua) or a team that advances out of the first round.

Personally, assuming there are no upsets of Pot A or B teams (or of us), my ideal group would consist of the US from Pot A and T&T from Pot B. I don't mean any disrespect to the Americans from this, I rate them higher than Costa Rica at the moment but I think our lads would simply perform better against the Americans due to the cross-border rivalry, the less hostile road environment and the presence of a large contingent of Voyageurs if we play in the US. The reason I want T&T from Pot B is because I want payback.

The group of death will be whoever gets Honduras from Pot B (I admit it, Bora scares me.) :)

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mattbin Newbie

mattbin

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quote:Originally posted by amacpher

And also Turkey edged the Netherlands for the final #1 seed in Europe! That makes sense. I'm sure if Turkey hadn't drawn against world powers Latvia in the playoff, they also would have won 6-nil.

Is that the only reason they were seeded above the Netherlands? I mean, they did finish slightly higher than the Netherlands in the last world cup.

Allez les Rouges,

M@

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beachesl Community Regular

beachesl

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Looks like they put-off the decision again on how the half-place playoffs in November, 2005, will be done. A pretty charged decision, but I guess they can leave it until the last minute (October, 2005).

The official rules as to the draw are found at adobe site:

http://fifaworldcup.yahoo.com/releases/all_zones_draw_procedure_en2.pdf

It looks like they are leaving the actual scheduling of the venues of the WCQ qualifying to each Confederation.

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beachesl Community Regular

beachesl

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FIFA has also approved the schedule (dates and venues for all group positions) of the actual tournament in 2006. They have not yet placed Germany in a Group.

http://images.fifa.com/wc/2006/media/2003_12_03_match_schedule_E.pdf

My bet is that they go back to the pre-1974 tradition of opening (the first match is scheduled for June 9, 2006, at Munich) with the host country, instead of the tradition since then of opening with the defending champion (whether Brazil qualifies or not, almost a sure thing). This would be for planning purposes, but also to show off the new Munich stadium and to celebrate the unity of Germany at the country's first major sporting event since 1990 (which they wanted to do at an unawarded Berlin Olympics). This would mean that Germany would be the top seed in Group A.

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beachesl Community Regular

beachesl

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Blatter has apparently told reporters today that the decision as to the half-spot playoffs may be made tomorrow (Thursday) at the scheduled FIFA Executive Meeting, according to this article:

FIFA president Sepp Blatter says his executive committee which meets Thursday has three options:

http://www.readsport.com/article.asp?art=499

According to this article, which may not have much veracity given that it is from a site devoted mainly to betting, the whole issue as to South America getting a potential 5th spot at the expense of Oceania getting an automatic spot is revisited. He is paraphrased as setting out that the following 3 options are being considered:

- a draw for all four teams with the winners of the two matches qualifying for Germany

- a regional draw with Asia versus Oceania and South America versus CONCACAF

- give Oceania direct entry at the expense of the fifth South America team and hold a play-off between Asia and CONCACAF

If Blatter said this, he is incredibly stupid, as it would foul up the atmosphere for Friday. My bet is that they put off the decision further so as to prevent furhter distraction and controversy this week.

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argh1 Newbie

argh1

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Ahhhhhhh, well like uhmmmm, kinda like aaaaaaaa.Pools,maybes, ahhhhhh

I need more drugs mon......ouch my head hurts[:o)]

Will they just give Oceania it's one spot for being a confederation and let S.A have the spot they want. So we can playoff against Asia!!

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