CONMEBOL club WoSo

Yes it's true Elo's formula implicitly weighs more recent games, but there's also a latency period, and considering how few games are generally played each year I was curious as to how stable the ratings currently were. And I question your results.... by my count, PAR is 6-2-3 (not 8-2-3) and CHI is 7-3-4, so CHI should be ahead of PAR on that time scale. 11 or 14 games is usually under the threshold for stabilization in Elo; usually stabilization is at 20 or 30 games, depending on your weightings. If you add 2011 and 2012 into the picture to get around 20 games each, PAR is 8-4-5 and CHI is 13-6-5

Well dang... @_@''

 

Well well, unlike last year, home field advantage has actually been an advantage, it seems!

Granted, it's taken an epic collapse in group C for group A to benefit, but details details...

Also really interesting to see that two out of the four SF teams are set and yet neither of those two are Brazilian! Will be quite the story if this is the first CLF with no Brazilian team in the SFs... And still impressive if this CLF is just the second without a Chilean team in the SFs (which would also make it the first with neither of the previous year's finalists in the current SFs). It's already the first CLF where the defending champion was eliminated in the groups!

 

Huh, I'm only just now realizing that we never made the final update on the 2016 CLF.

Foz edged Colon on PKs 3-1 after a nil-nil draw; even with the loss, it's Colon's best finish to date.
Limpeno won the title 2-1 with the winning goal against Gaurico coming way late, in the 89th minute.

What a surprising tournament!
- - - - -
Due to Sportivo Limpeno's wins in both the CLF and in their domestic league, the 2016 Paraguayan runners-up Cerro Porteno have qualified with Paraguay's spot for the 2017 CLF as Limpeno take the defending champion spot. Watch for yet another hand-me-down since Paraguay has expressed interest in hosting.

Also currently-qualified are last year's 4th-place Colon from URU, Universitario from PER, Colo-Colo from CHI, and (as discussed earlier) Audax from BRA.

Next to be determined looks like the ECU spot, with the sixth and final gameday of the second stage to be played soon (the fifth gameday was the weekend of the 11th/12th). Quito has already won stage 2's Group B, while group A has Espuce on 12pts and hosting Unión Española on 10pts. Then I assume there will be a final between Quito and the group A winner.

Also to watch right now is Argentina, which seems to have switched from an in-calendar-year schedule to a cross-calendar-year schedule. The league this year consists of 12 teams in an around Buenos Aires, all of who have played 7 or 8 games so far - with the exception of UAIU, who have only played 5 so far. Counting games in hand, the league has more or less already come down to four teams - Boca Juniors and River Plate have both only dropped 2pts in their 8 games so far, with San Lorenzo right behind with just one loss in their first 8, and UAIU with one loss in their first 5. All that said, they're supposed to be in gameweek 18 right now, so every team has seen at least 10 games postponed - there hasn't been a single game played since the second week of December. =-/

 

As much as I'm glad we're not seeing an overload of Brazilian teams this year... I don't think Paraguay is deep enough to have three CLF-level teams. If I had to say which countries could support 3 CLF teams, I'd say BRA, CHI, and maybe ARG. Heck, BRA could send 4 or 5 and they'd all be competitive. I would love to see the tournament expanded soon. It sucks that a maximum of two nations can have multiple reps.

Also to note: the article linked above says Unión Española is ECU's rep, so I guess they not only won Group A but were able to upset Quito and show that last year's breakthrough wasn't a flash in the pan.

Elsewhere in South America, is seems that the Argentine Campeonato has resumed as all teams but two have now played 16 games (there was just a single postponement this past weekend). The top four are actually rather tight: Boca Juniors, 44pts - River Plate, 43pts - UAIU, 39pts - San Lorenzo, 37pts.

 

35,000!
https://www.facebook.com/fifawomensworldcup/posts/1502110976498428

 

Normal country qualification spot + host spot + defending champions spot.
Brazil has had three teams qualify this way a few times before too.
The tournament in general is ten country spots plus one defending champion spot plus one host spot.

 

I don't think I can really pick my four SF teams at this point since I can see two teams advancing from each of the three groups... It really comes down to who ties and who doesn't. But as such, I think it's safe to say the six teams in contention are Guarico, River Plate, Colo Colo, Cerro Porteno, Audax, and Sportivo Limpeno.

 

http://elperiodico-digital.com/2017/09/23/deportivo-ita-campeon-nacional-de-futbol-femenino/
Deportivo ITA beat San Simon by the narrowest of margins, 1-0, to advance to the CLF for the first time after being league runners-up for the previous two seasons.

 

CLF 2017 begins tomorrow! Will be interesting to see which teams rise to the top, since it seems like the overall crop is pretty good even considering that there's only one Brazilian team involved. Hoping for a good way to follow the competition, but not expecting much.

Speaking of Brazil and the CLF, it look like we already know Brazil's first CLF 2018 participant - or, rather, it's been known for a while but just hasn't been mentioned here. X'-D After a big restructuring of the Campeonato Brasileiro, (which means the champion has to wait over a year before participating in the CLF!) Santos returned to the summit. Santos previously won the first two editions of the CLF but then slipped into 3rd in the 3rd edition and then faded out of Brasilian football completely for a couple years before returning to the league.

 

Well uuuhhh this is an interesting development...

After the first two days of games (one matchday for groups A and B), the entire tournament was postponed for three days due to multiple players on various teams showing signs of food poisoning. =-S Tournament will resume on the 12th, when group C plays its first matches.

The matches that have been played so far:
River Plate 1–1 Unión Española
Deportivo Capiatá 0–2 Estudiantes de Guárico
Colo Colo 5–1 Universitario
Cerro Porteño 2–1 Colón
So no real surprises up to this point, though that group A draw will likely come in to play in determining which group runner-up moves on.

 

First games of group C will be later this evening, but the second games of group A are now in the books:
Gaurico 1-1 Union Espanola
River Plate 2-1 Capiata

Deportivo Capiata is out, and it's impossible for the 2nd-place team to have more than 5pts after matchday 3, so it's almost certain that you either win the group of you're out. It's easy for Quarico and River Plate: beat the other on matchday 3 and you're through to the semifinals. If that match ends in a draw, though, I think that opens the door for Union Espanola to squeak into the top spot if they beat Capiata by enough goals.

 

I may have severely underestimated Santa Fe's shot at advancing out of Group C... Either that, or Deportivo ITA is just that bad, because Santa Fe is currently atop group C after a 9-2 thrashing of Deportivo ITA! Audax also beat Sprotivo Limpeno by a score of 2-0. I guess it might be that Deportivo is just that bad, because I think that strong of a win shouldn't come with giving up 2 goals - i.e. a bad team was able to find mistakes to punish, so Santa Fe might be in for a rude awakening against the other two teams. It's worth noting the only game last year with a GD of 5 or more was also a win by the Colombian team... who then didn't advance out of the group.

 

Cerro Porteno versus Colo Colo is proceeding as normal, but it seems like Colon versus Universitario de Deportes has been postponed to the 15th. I guess some players are still sick?

 

Colo Colo comes back from 0-2 down to earn the draw with Cerro Porteno, 2-2 final. If both teams win on the third matchday, (likely IMO,) it's almost certain that both will advance to the SFs since the 2nd-place team in group B would have 7pts. I can't say who will advance from group A, but I'm guessing that Audax is the team to come out of group C with 9pts.

 

Okay, I think Deportivo ITA really is pretty bad... They lost big time again, this time to Audax - but once again, they were able to score, being able to put one past the Brazilian club despite the ultimate score of 6-1. So I'm not sure Santa Fe giving up two was *so* bad...

As such, it's not so surprising that Santa Fe and Sportivo Limpeno drew 2-2 yesterday as well. Good result for Santa Fe, but considering that every 12-team CLF to date has seen the best-runner-up have 6 or more points, the tournament is likely over for both team unless Santa Fe can stun Audax on Tuesday. (Either way, this is the second time in a row - and the second time ever - that the defending champion fails to make it to the SFs.)

The delayed Colon-Universitatio game was played earlier today with Universitario the 1-0 winners. The group B final matches will be played tomorrow, with the group A final matches played today.

 

Group A final matches:
Estudiantes de Guarico 0-1 River Plate
Union Espanola 3-1 Deportivo Cpaiata
As I said way back when, I don't think Capiata was CLF-level, and they finish the tournament with 0pts (though only a -5GD). I was correct that River Plate was likely to advance from the group, but my other pick Guarico (last year's CLF runners-up) slips to third as they lost to River Plate instead of drawing like Union Espanola did. (Interestingly, if they *had* drawn, I believe Union Espanola would have won the group on overall GD). Union Espanola ends up in 2nd with only 5pts, though, so they don't qualify for the SFs.

Group B final matches:
Colon 2-5 Colo Colo
Universitario 0-3 Cerro Porteno
No real surprises here! Perennial contenders Colo Colo tops the group on GD, while 2014's third-place finnishers Cerro Porteno also end with 7pts and get to represent the host country in the SFs. Last year's 4th-place finishers Colon end with 0pts and a -5GD as well; that 0-1 loss to Universitario may be the only real surprise result of the group, especially since Colon beat Universitario in the group stage last year 4-0 (Universitario ended last year at 0pts, -10GD, and Peru is the only nation to have never qualified for the SFs).

Group C final matches:
Deportivo ITA 1-6 Sportivo Limpeno
Corinthians/Audax 2-1 Sante Fe
Last year's defending champions earn a blowout win over this year's punching bag (-17 GD! Still got 4 goal for, though) but it's not enough to even earn 2nd in the group. Santa Fe seems like they were able to hang in there fairly well against the Brazilian champions, with both of Audax's goals coming in just the first 3min of the second half. (I'd need to see match report to actually know how representative the final score was of the game itself.)

Semifinals tomorrow:
River Plate v Colo Colo
Corinthians/Audax v Cerro Porteno