I don't think the Perisic handball is a great example. That HAD to be called and was an obvious error. Perisic follows the ball with his eyes, his arm is going down from his jump, the ball changes direction, and then he quickly lowers his arm even faster to block the ball. It was a reflex but clearly looked intentional. The Argentina handball in the box is a better example of what you are saying.
Most do not agree with you - of commentators I've heard. e.g. http://www.espn.com/soccer/blog/the-match/60/post/3566255/undefined Also of the regular crew on espnfc daily, nobody thought it was a pen.
Well then that is crazy. I don’t understand how people don’t see his eyes following the ball and then slapping it with his hand in an extremely unnatural position. He’s literally playing volleyball. His arms weren’t just “coming down from a jump”
I’d say from the pundits I’ve seen, that they are 50/50 on it. I just can’t see the other half so don’t see that as deliberate. That’s as deliberate as they come, Suarez aside.
However, if you look at just the first round, Concacaf is ahead of Africa, who did not send any teams to the second round. By looking at all games you include Mexico's R16 loss to Brazil, which causes Concacaf's average to dip below Africa's. We need to compare apples to apples, so either first round results, or average or median finish place in the WC for each confed. Losing in R16 should not count as a negative against a group of teams who could not get one member that far.
That's a good point. Although how well Mexico did was more than balanced negatively by how poorly the other two did. A one-team confederation can't be good. All of that is moot, though, since FIFA won't be using the Continental Strength Coefficient any more from now on: https://resources.fifa.com/image/up...orld-ranking.pdf?cloudid=jgxjkdrj1jfwyunjbkha