Why do people say CONCACAF is crap?

For mexico and u.s. its nothing less than automatic that they go to the world cup. That would change DRASTICALLY if they would play in the CONMEBOL qualifiers and costa rica would never see another world cup again.

Possibly a bit more accurate but they have some flaws. They favour a team who is a big fish in a little pond and teams that don't play a lot but do reasonably well when they do. If you avarage out the FIFA and ELO ratings you tend to get a better reflection of the real position.

really? if you think Ecuador, Peru, Chile, Bolivia, Venezuela, etc (including Colombia, excluding Brasil and Argentina) are ¨way¨ better than CR, then you are wrong, check some results in the the last CopaAmericas, we always give those teams a hard time, i admire southamerican soccer, your country Colombia as well as Uruguay are my fav southamerican teams,.... 20+ years ago we were nothing compared to southamerica,but things change and Costa Rica is able to compete against most of the southamerican countries. ARG and BRA are 2 different things, they´ll keep kikcking our a$$ at least for the next 10 years....

CONCACAF 3.5
CONMEBOL 4.5
-----------------
both together 8 spots

Best 3 teams in our continent

1-Brazil
2-Argentina
3-Mexico


the other 5 spots will be for 5 of the following 6 teams

-US
-Costa Rica
-Paraguay
-Colombia
-Ecuador
-Uruguay

Peru, chile, Venezuela, and Bolivia and the rest fo concacaf have less chances.

We might not qualify to all the WC´s and we surely will have a harder WCQ, but saying that we would never see another world cup again makes NO sense for me.

What would a combined qualification stage look like?

This would be my idea

Top Ranked 3 Nations currently Brazil, Agentina & Mexico enter at Stage 2.
The remaining 42 teams are split into two pots based on rankings and play a two leg home and away knock out play-off.


Pot A (Top 21)

8 USA
18 Uruguay
21 Costa Rica
24 Colombia
30 Paraguay
37 Ecuador
41 Honduras
42 Jamaica
50 Trinidad and Tobago
56 Guatemala
64 Chile
66 Peru
67 Venezuela
75 Cuba
78 Panama
84 Canada
96 Bolivia
98 Haiti
115 Barbados
124 El Salvador
128 St. Lucia

Pot B (Bottom 21)

129 St. Kitts and Nevis
130 St. Vincent and the Grenadines
151 Grenada
152 Nicaragua
152 Surinam
154 Antigua and Barbuda
161 Bermuda
167 Guyana
168 Netherlands Antilles
171 British Virgin Islands
172 Dominica
174 Dominican Republic
180 Belize
181 Cayman Islands
193 Bahamas
195 Puerto Rico
196 US Virgin Islands
198 Anguilla
200 Aruba
202 Montserrat
203 Turks and Caicos Islands


Stage 2

The 24 qualifiers are split into 6 pots of 4 teams agian based on FIFA rankings. These would be the pots asuming all seeds qualified from stage 1.

Pot A

1 Brazil
4 Agrentina
5 Mexico
8 USA

Pot B

18 Uruguay
21 Costa Rica
24 Colombia
30 Paraguay

Pot C

37 Ecuador
41 Honduras
42 Jamaica
50 Trinidad and Tobago

Pot D

56 Guatemala
64 Chile
66 Peru
67 Venezuela

Pot E

75 Cuba
78 Panama
84 Canada
96 Bolivia

Pot F

98 Haiti
115 Barbados
124 El Salvador
128 St. Lucia

Example of final groups drawn using an online random number generator to draw pots into groups. Top 2 would qualify from each group.

Group 1

4 Argentina
21 Costa Rica
42 Jamaica
67 Venezuela
78 Panama
98 Haiti

Group 2

5 Mexico
18 Uruguay
37 Ecuador
56 Guatemala
75 Cuba
124 El Salvador

Group 3

1 Brazil
24 Colombia
50 Trinidad and Tobago
64 Chile
84 Canada
128 St. Lucia

Group 4

8 USA
30 Paraguay
41 Honduras
66 Peru
96 Bolivia
115 Barbados

I think finishing in the top 2 of most of these groups is harder than the current top 3 or 4th and play off vs 5th best Asian side. Sides like Costa Rica, Trinidad & Tobago or Jamaica would find it a lot tougher

As would Columbia, Paraguay, Ecuador, and Chile.

I think this is a great system and well balanced. The best teams are still likely to get in (Bra, Arg, Mex, US), but there's plenty of opportunity for the mid-tier teams to shine.

The only variation I'd throw out there would be avoid the meaningless and complete blowout games by having two rounds:

Round 1:
4 groups of 4 from Pots C-F. Best 2 go on.

Round 2:
4 groups of 4 from Pots A-B + 8 from Round 1. Best 2 qualify.

i think thats a great system. But I doubt FIFA will make any changes soon, especially if the US or MEX go far in 2006.

When did I say that? I wasn't comparing them to Argentina or Brazil. I said that under this qualification scheme they would be expected to qualify for the WC, as would Mexico, Argentina and Brazil. Completely different thing.

"The US will lose to Brazil in the quarterfinals." <-- See? It's not that hard to use them in the same sentence!

Come on the Eurosnobs!

if only someone explained that to the people who do the fifa world rankings...

That is why they should combine with CONMEBOL - at least Asia (esp if combined with Oceania) and Africa have the numbers on their side, even if their quality is about the same as Concacaf

I disagree and I have noticed that this idea is usually brought up by australians. Why is that ? Anyways conmebol stands to gain nothing from such a combination except the extra long hour flights.

Greece was in the 3rd pot.

These were the seedings for the WC qualifiers - UEFA zone:

Pot A: France, Portugal, Sweden, Czech Republic, Spain, Italy, England, Turkey
Pot B: Netherlands, Croatia, Belgium, Denmark, Russia, Ireland Republic, Slovenia, Poland
Pot C: Bulgaria, Romania, Scotland, Serbia & Montenegro, Switzerland, Greece, Slovakia, Austria
Pot D: Ukraine, Iceland, Finland, Norway, Israel, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Latvia, Wales
Pot E: Hungary, Georgia, Belarus, Cyprus, Estonia, Nothern Ireland, Lithuania, Macedonia FYR
Pot F: Albania, Armenia, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Faroe Islands, Malta, San Marino, Liechtenstein
Pot G: Andorra, Luxembourg, Kazakhstan

I think Aussies bring it up because we have such a hard qualification (1 off meaningfull game (H&A) - and the USA and Mexico have by far the easiest qualification group. Other than that it seams that most people would support it, the teams with greater travel times would be those at the far north or south - which in most cases happen to be the "richer" teams. Asia and Oceania will join soon, I'm sure of it, and I think New Zealand to Tashkent would be further than Santiago to Montreal

You could also use the qualifiers to determine the teams for Copa America. Top 15 (+host) would qualify.

For example, for the next Copa America invite the 6 teams from the last stage of the CONCACAF hex.

There would be 4 pots:

1 Brazil
4 Argentina
5 Mexico
8 USA

18 Uruguay
21 Costa Rica
24 Colombia
30 Paraguay

37 Ecuador
50 Trinidad and Tobago
56 Guatemala
64 Chile

66 Peru
67 Venezuela
78 Panama
96 Bolivia

Possible draw:

Group A: Brazil, Paraguay, Ecuador, Panama
Group B: Argentina, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Bolivia
Group C: Mexico, Colombia, Trinidad and Tobago, Peru
Group D: USA, Uruguay, Chile, Venezuela

if that was a draw it would be awesome. It would really make the world cup more competitive

What about the possibility of snatching more than 4.5 qualifications? As it stands, no matter how well CONMEBOL performs, with just 10 members they'll never see another qualification slot.

Doubtful, especially if two extra spots were given to comebol. Mexico, after all, routinely finishes in the top three in Copa Americas, and Paraguay, that perennial qualifier from comebol has never beaten the US, I believe. The US and Mexico would still pretty much qualify a whole bunch. CR would have more competition at the margin with Uruguay and Colombia, etc., it's true.

Why is CONCACAF so crap? Easy. 1 crap team gets in the WC automaticaly because no other CONCACAF team can beat them apart from Mexico. Nah. It's just revolved around 2 teams. USA and Mexico.

The combined CONCACAF/CONMEBOL qualifying groups various people have posted? Awesome. I would love to see that really happen.

Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, USA are still pretty much locks with 8 teams going through. But it makes the competition for the next four spots much more competitive.

The main reason I’d like to see this though is because I’d love to see the US get more experience through the qualifying phase, playing other tough teams besides just Mexico. Right now at least we seem to have their number.

That's the beauty of it... everyone benefits from more competition.

Concacaf gets respectability and better opportunities for improvement.
Conmebol gets World Cup spots and can dump it's insane 10 team, 81 game qualification format.

Brazil, Argentina
They get more solid competition to test their teams out against. They're both going to still be the best, but adding regular games against the US and Mexico can only help them compete against Europe.

US, Mexico
Obviously better competition and confederation respectability benefit the big boys of Concacaf, possibly more than anyone else.

Costa Rica, Paraguay, Ecuador, Uruguay
These teams gain precious qualification slots available below the big boys (even as competition increases) as well as the incentive to keep their FA, youth programs, and internal leagues running smoothly

T&T, Honduras, Jamaica, Columbia, Chile
These teams have much increased hope of piping one of the final spots in a larger pool than in either confederatoin alone. When there's really only 2 spots to fight over, there aren't many scraps. Plus the incentive may be greatest for these teams to improve and/or turn things around (thus Columbia being in this group instead of the above one where they belong).

Canada, Cuba, El Salvador, Panama, Venezula, Peru, Bolivia
Looking to the future, how can a more competitive western hemisphere not benefit teams like these?

the reason people say concacaf is crappy is that it is, the best teams in concacaf or usa and mexico, neither of which are any where near the level of the best uefa or caf teams, usa and mex are not as good as the sort of second rate european teams like (this may be slightly contorversial) the czech republic, sweden and portugal. The USA would probably be about as good as the ukraine or croatia who lets face it not great.

So, to sum up people say concacaf is ******** because it is. Yes the usa and mexico might have brilliant qualifying records but they are the best of a very bad bunch.