[photar74]

Problems with the current WC format:

What are the current biggest problems that different parties have with the WC? Let’s break them down, party by party:

1. FIFA: FIFA wants more money. This is why FIFA has tried to establish the unpopular Confederations Cup and World Club Championship, and why there was a proposal for a WC every two years. This is also why FIFA works to spread allocations to regions where new markets can be opened. Simply put, FIFA wants MORE.

2. Confederations: Every single confederation wants more spaces. There isn’t a single confederation out there that believes it deserves as many allocations as it already has. On the contrary, every confederation believes it deserves more allocations than it already has.

3. Clubs: Clubs are annoyed at the number of national team matches in which their players must participate.

4. Small Nations: Small nations have far less possibility of qualifying for a WC (than large nations), and even less a possibility of ever hosting a WC than large nations.

5. Me (hell, its my thread, I can add my complaint). I find it annoying that losing your first two matches means certain elimination in this WC. If that’s the case, why not just have a straight, 32-team knockout round? Why give poor calls and fluky plays so high a chance of ruining a team’s trip to the WC? That’s my complaint.

These are the problems--I have a solution.

[photar74]

There is a simple, if seemingly excessive, solution to all of these problems: a 48 team WC. The format would become eight groups of six, round robin, as opposed to the current eight groups of four, round robin. The top team in every group would advance to the 1/8-finals. The 2nd and 3rd place teams in every group would advance to a 16-team knockout stage, the winners of which would advance to the 1/8 finals. While the tournament would last 43 days, as opposed to the current 31, we shall see that this increase would not matter and not be a bother to any of the involved parties. This is because a 48 team WC would solve everyone’s problems. Let’s break it down:

1. FIFA would be rolling in money with a 48 team WC. First, it could open new markets all around the world. Second, a 48-team WC every four years would have more games than a two 32 team WCs every four years (144-128). Third, all forty-eight nations represented would have five guaranteed games--can you imagine the TV audience for the first round of matches? Overall, it would be such a cash cow for FIFA that FIFA probably wouldn’t even care that no one cares the World Club Championships or the Confederations Cup.

2. Every confederation would have more than enough allocations. A simple breakdown could be: UEFA 20.0, CAF 7.0, AFC 6.5, CONCACAF 6.0, CONMEBOL 6.0, OFC 1.5, Host 1.0 (If there is more than one host, simply subtract the number of hosts over 1.0 from the host confederation’s total allocations. An example would be: Japan and South Korea both from AFC = 1.0 more than 1.0, which means 5.5 for AFC plus hosts). It is hard to imagine any confederation complaining about these allocations (except, perhaps, AFC). Even if they did, it’s hard to imagine a situation where there wouldn’t be any easy compromise worked out. We’re talking about a huge number of allocations here.

3. A 48 team WC would require either 9 or 10 matches for the finalists and semifinalists, thereby irritating clubs. However, with 48 teams in the finals, the amount of qualifiers would be significantly reduced. This would be great for clubs, since qualifiers take place during the club season in most countries. In fact, qualifiers and friendlies are the real sticking points in the club vs. country struggle, not WC finals or continental finals. Clubs would actually get to keep their players for more time with a 48 team WC than with a 32 team WC because there would be fewer qualifiers in a 48 team WC than with a 32 team WC. In a WC year, the European season would need to end one week early and start three weeks late, but the time gained by clubs through reduced qualifiers would far outweigh this concession.

4. Small nations would be far better off, and not just because it would be easier for them to qualify. With 48 teams, who would really care if there were two hosts? Three hosts? Hell, why not have four hosts? Under this format, you would vastly increase the number of nations that could be WC hosts, simply because multiple hosting wouldn’t be a problem. The cool thing is that you would still only need twelve venues (twelve matches in each venue would be enough).

5. Teams can recover from bad starts to the tournament. I feel that this not only gives all teams more chances, but also it reduces the possibility of “fluke” wins or bad calls ruining a team’s WC run. This is, of course, not even to mention the vast amounts of money that can be wrought from having five group matches for each of the 48 qualifiers, instead of three matches for each of the 32 qualifiers.

Best of all, we could stop arguing about allocations, about bad qualifying draws, about club managers that won’t release their players, etc., and just sit back and enjoy the greatest six weeks every four years has to offer. Sure, qualifying would be easier, but it wouldn’t be a given, even for top nations (Netherlands and Yugoslavia would both still have not qualified, and the USA would have sweated a lot as the Barbados game would have been for all the marbles. Costa Rica would have worried even more).

A 48 team WC is to the benefit of everyone. If soccer is going to continue to expand worldwide, then its premier tournament also needs to expand. The current size of 32 has already proved to be too small (see the confederation struggle for more places as an example). Expand the game. Expand the World Cup.

[photar74]

What’s that you say? Scheduling would be a nightmare? Well, a 48-team WC would not even be difficult to schedule. The WC would begin on the second Sunday of June every WC year. From that point, the schedule would be as follows:

Sunday-Wednesday: Group Stage, first set (six matches per day)
Thursday-Sunday: Group Stage, second set (six matches per day)
Tuesday-Friday: Group Stage, third set (six matches per day)
Saturday-Tuesday: Group Stage, fourth set (six matches per day)
Thursday-Sunday: Group Stage, fifth set (six matches per day)
Tuesday & Wednesday: First Knockout Round (four matches per day)
Saturday, Sunday: 1/8 Finals (four matches per day)
Saturday: Quarterfinals (four matches)
Wednesday: Semifinals (two matches)
Saturday: 3rd Place match (one match)
Sunday: Final (one match)

This schedule runs 43 days, although with more rest than the current tournament allows. Tournament begins between June 8-14, and ends between July 20-26.

It would probably be good to increase the number of subs to four, in this scenario. If a knockout stage match went into extra time, each team could have five subs. All told, with the breaks built into the schedule and with the extra sub, this system would probably reduce the strain on players (at least compared to the current model).

The first 48-team WC could be USA 2014. Its way too late for 2006, and bids for 2010 are being prepared based on the 32-team format. However, 2014 can be different. The country that could most easily handle a 48-team WC, the USA, would get the first shot at doing so.

I even think that when the USSF presents its bid to host the 2014 tournament, they should propose that the 2014 WC be a 48-team tournament. Talk about the clincher—there would cease to be any opposition to the US bid whatsoever if it was combined with a 48-team WC proposal. It would be end of story, end of game.

[photar74]

If there were a 48 team WC in ’02 (there were certainly enough venues between Japan and South Korea), with the allocations described in a previous post, the following teams would have also qualified:

UEFA: Austria, Czech Republic, Ukraine, Romania, (Slovakia-Scotland winner)
CAF: (Zimbabwe-Liberia winner), (Ivory Coast-Morocco winner)
AFC: Iran, UAE, (Bahrain-Uzbekistan winner)
CONCACAF: Honduras, Jamaica, T &T
OFC: Australia, (New Zealand vs. Bahrain-Uzbekistan loser)
CONMEBOL: Columbia

Only four or five teams would be true fodder, and that is right now. By 2014, every confederation can probably fill its allocations with quality sides.

Frankly, I think the whole setup is a thing of extreme beauty.

Expand the game. Go to 48 teams (and then hold at that number for a few decades).

[Bauser]

I understand you're a newbie to the forums, but we have had this debate countless times already, therefore the poor response to the thread.

After heated discussions it all boils down to the same thing:

The World Cup works best with 32 teams.

[lanman]

Firstly, I belive that 48 teams will be the next logical step for FIFA to take. Unfortunately, the confederations may not be too keen, as it would have increase the number of games played, and many now believe that too many are played. If there were to be a general re-structuring of the international calender, then it could work.

60% of South American teams qualifying seems a bit excessive to me. My personal view on the qualifying would be to combine Asia and Oceania aswell as North and South America. This would give four relatively similar sized qualifying bodies, and re-allocation of places based on performance would be easier.

Lastly, 2014 will not be going to North America. South America (or Europe if there are no serious bids) will host the World Cup.

[mr magoo]

It's perfect the way it is. If you have 48 teams competting then soon you will want 64 teams involved and then 96 and then the circle continues. If the countries were good enough to be in the world cup they would qualify from the qualification satges to get into the proper tournament.

Adding more teams would mean more games and managers are as upset enough as it is with the current international schedual without adding 3 or 4 more games on.

[ursula]

Nice to read a series of posts by someone who actually put the time to think it out. Way to go, photar.

It would be interesting to see a response to the contrary that was actually thought out.

[photar74]

I would like to say first and foremost that I originally believed a 32-team WC was the perfect format and that it should stay at that number for the foreseeable future. However, I turned to the expansion idea as a result of my work over the past two months to try and develop a statistical system to determine “deserved” WC allocations. Time and time again I came to the conclusion that UEFA, CONMEBOL, CONCACAF and OFC were being screwed by AFC (and, to a significantly lesser extent, by CAF).

Everyone at FIFA, including AFC delegates, knows they are over-represented, at least in terms of quality. However, everyone also knows that in UEFA and CONMEBOL, the soccer market is pretty much tapped out—there simply isn’t much room for expansion. As far as CONCACAF goes, as long as Mexico and the USA qualify, Canada is the only lucrative CONCACAF market that misses most WCs. In OFC, Australia is the only lucrative market (well, maybe New Zealand).

So what is FIFA to do? If it really wanted the 32 teams to qualify to be more or less the 32 best teams in the world, it would have to cut into AFC’s total. However, reducing AFC’s total is, quite simply, bad business. There are numerous lucrative markets in the AFC that can still be tapped, and locking them out of the WC reduces the possibility to expand the sport worldwide.

However, at this point allowing more teams from AFC into the WC would require further reductions to the already lucrative UEFA markets (and, to a lesser extent, the somewhat lucrative CONMEBOL markets). Basically, my point is that a 32 team WC is bad for FIFA, business-wise. It leaves out some of the best teams AND it hinders the possibility of future market expansion.

[photar74]

Before I made my original series of posts, I even went to the World Bank website to see just how bad a 32-team WC is for FIFA, in terms of market size. Here are the total GNI figures for the sixteen largest markets that were left out of the most recent WC, in millions:

Canada 677,178
India 477,555
Australia 368,571
Netherlands 374,976
Switzerland 247,362
Austria 188,742
Norway 165,458
Indonesia 145,306
Venezuela 124,948
Finland 121,987
Iran 118,868
Thailand 114,760
Greece 116,347
Israel 110,386

This is some pretty lucrative stuff. Further, strong or potentially strong soccer nations such as Egypt, Morocco, Algeria, Columbia, Chile, Peru, Czech Republic, Ukraine, Hungary, Romania and New Zealand are in the next 16. When combined, all of these nations have a GNI more than half that of the entire EU. Still further, all of these nations (except India and Indonesia) have either qualified or come close to qualifying for the WC in the recent past.

To ignore the potential for further market expansion in the WC that would not erode the high level of play in current WCs would be reminiscent of the conservative, patrician—even colonial—leadership of FIFA before Joao Haveledge. The current 32-team setup will either continue to allow teams such as China into the WC over the Netherlands despite the obvious gap in quality of play, or it will continue to allow teams such as Uruguay in over Australia despite the massive market advantages of a team such as Australia.

The only way to guarantee that all of the world’s best teams at a particular moment in time are in the WC and that every lucrative market has a reasonable shot at making the WC would be to expand to 48 teams.