Michel Platini calls for 40-team World Cup starting with Russia 2018 • Move would combat Blatter plan to reduce European teams • Fifa and Uefa want more African and Asian countries at finals The Uefa president, Michel Platini, wants to increase the number of teams competing in the World Cup finals from 32 to 40, starting in 2018. Platini, prompted by the Fifa president Sepp Blatter's desire to cut the number of European teams involved in the finals in favour of Africa and Asia, said his proposal would extend the tournament by only three days and would be "good for everybody". Platini told the Times: "I totally agree with Mr Blatter that we need more African and Asian [countries]. But instead of taking away some European, we have to go to 40 teams. We can add two African, two Asiatic, two American, one Oceania and one from Europe." Platini said the finals would grow to eight groups of five. "Football is changing … we have 209 associations, so why reduce? Make more people happy." Platini's proposal comes amid increased tension with Blatter before the next Fifa presidential election in 2015. Asked what the Fifa president made of the idea, Platini said: "I haven't told him yet."
This is a my old idea ( 40 teams with 8 groups and 5 teams for group ) from at least 15 years..........I hope that the FIFA will do it in 2018 in Russia !!! I wish a World Cup with China, India, Indonesia etc.....
Well, based on the recent qualifiers for the past few World Cups, you're more likely to get West Asian teams in than any of those.
shutup, just shutup platini. 24 teams at the euro will end up ruining the tournament, which was perfect at 16. now 40 teams in a world cup when 32 is the perfect formula? ******** off you corrupt basterd.
They were ahead of Uzbekistan in the final round of 2010 qualifiers. But yeah, just short. If AFC had two more spots they would have gone to Bahrain and the Saudis. Wouldn't have even made a hypothetical intercontinental playoff, as the other group had a much better fourth placed team. Edit: Just noticed they also placed fourth in their five team groups of AFC final qualification round for 98 and 02 as well. Might have stood a chance for one of them.
24 for the Euros is fine, making your continental tournament shouldn't be as hard as making the World Cup. But 32 is fine for the World Cup.
Part of the charm with the Euros was the dramatic and difficult qualification, with the actual tournament rivaling the latter stages of the world cup in terms of each match being important with big games from the start. Now you'll have teams which will dilute the quality of play, and many teams playing to come second in a group to to play a third place team etc And its absolutely ridiculous when the Euro's are completely engaging now, to shift to a scenario where 2/3 of the teams make it to the next God damn round.
Eight spots to hand out (not that I agree with increasing the numbers). Each playoff spot becomes a full spot. That takes up 2 of the spots. Give the title holders automatic entry, that leaves 5 spots. I would decide them through playoffs, but its just as easy to give each confederation (apart from OFC) one of these spots. New allocation UEFA 14 AFC 6 CAF 6 CONCACAF 5 CONMEBOL 6 OFC 1 Host 1 Holder 1 Total 40
Yes. It's now official. Platini and Blatter are now competing to see who can "bribe" the most African and Asian countries in order to get their votes in the next election for General Secretary.
I am totally against expanding the tournament to include 40 teams. But as I have discussed repeatedly, I believe there should be more intercontinental matches in lieu of many of the direct or guaranteed spots for the various confederations. The best stop gap proposal, in the short run, in my opinion is the one outlined here. Down the line, to genuinely improve the participation of teams from around the world and spread around the advantages of hosting the tournament, I believe the proposal I have outlined in this thread would be the best way to go forward. But, yes, these others proposals by Blatter and now Platini look more like attempts to buy votes than any serious proposals to improve the World Cup tournament.
Everyone made a fuss about Eurobasket expanding to 24 teams when it was 16, and the first 24-team tournament was one of the most exciting ones ever. I don't see the teams that could lower the quality, there are for sure 24 competitive teams in Europe.
But expanding the World Cup to 40 teams would detract from its quality. It would also add to the fixtures that are played at the tournament by all these teams and already there are complaints about the number of games some of these players have to play.
Yeah, I agree I completely am against 40 teams at a World Cup. I was just refering to the 24-team-Euro.
This is what happens when politics intersects with sports. Let's face it....if your main purpose is to determine who is the best team in the world, you probably don't need anything bigger than a 16-team World Cup. Even with thirty-two teams, like we have now, you have 10-12 teams in each World Cup that have virtually no chance of even making the quarterfinals. At this point, you gotta wonder if this type of political nonsense (along with the Qatar 2022 fiasco) is what finally gets the major footballing nations to break away from FIFA and form their own organization. One nation, one vote governance (i.e. FIFA) simply does not work in a situation where there is such a big difference between nations. Let's face it....any governance system is which Madagascar, Andorra, Tahiti, and the Bahamas have the same amount of voting power as the likes of Brazil, the United States, and Germany is a bit nuts...
No African team has ever reached the semifinals of the World Cup. But it already has more places than South America, which has won the World Cup nine times. Why does it need even more?
While I am totally against expansion of the tournament to accommodate more guaranteed or direct spots for any confederation (be it CAF, AFC, or UEFA or Conembol, etc), I am not sure I share some of the sentiments expressed here. At at this core, the sentiments I am alluding to appear myopic and static. Myopic because they see things only from the prism of the self-interests of certain fans and a few nations. Static because they assume how certain things have been in the past is how they will be in the future. To exemplify what I mean, let me draw a comparison between football and cricket. Cricket is a game that apparently has a huge following in a few select countries, while much of the rest of the world (including mine) couldn't care less about it. The idea that we should limit the World Cup to a few teams (chosen through quota system that puts a short ceiling on how many teams can participate from the most populous regions in the world) is simply myopic and confuses football with cricket! A World Cup that leaves out most of the world's population from having even a legitimate chance to participate in it is simply not something I would support. What's more, who says that today or 4 years from now, there won't be 10 or more teams from AFC alone that would each be as strong as the marginal qualifiers from UEFA? Whatever the gap (if much at all) that exists between Saudi Arabia (presently ranked #10th in the AFC despite having made the knock out rounds in the 1994 World Cup) or China (presently ranked 9th in the AFC), and teams like Greece or Slovakia or Slovenia and the like, who says that gap can't be closed in 4 years? And if closed, how can the answer to whether Iran/Japan/South /or Australia made it to the round of 16 or quarterfinals or the semifinals or the final (or whatever other arbitrary criteria one selects), have much bearing on the question? It is perfectly conceivable that we could have 10 teams from the AFC that would really rate between 16-32 in the world (and hence have a legitimate right to be in the World Cup), even if the best one them might rate no better than say top 15. For me at least, I know the right answer to the issue of World Cup allocations is not to continue the present system which has different confederation fight over (what I consider to be artificial) quotas. The best system would try to increase the number of intercontinental matches, while also increasing as much as possible the exposure and experience of various countries from around the world, without ultimately detracting from the ultimate appeal of the World Cup itself. In this regard, 32 teams in the World Cup seems to be the right number in every sense. What needs to be fixed is how many of them are chosen.
All true, but people have to realize that the problem is a political one and has nothing to do with football. Fact: Blatter and Platini are running against each other for General Secretary in 2015 Fact: Asia and Africa are two large federations with many poor countries run by kleptocratic dictators who love to receive bribes, hence the proposals to give those federations more places at the World Cup. Fact: Only 73 out of the 209 members of FIFA have EVER qualified for the World Cup. Fact: Madagascar and Nepal have the same amount of voting power within FIFA as Brazil & Germany. As long as there is a one-nation one-vote system, FIFA is going to be a joke when it comes to issues regarding the World Cup, for the simple reason that the majority of the voting power within FIFA lies with nations who have no stake in the outcome. Until that changes, nothing else will change. This is why I have suggested (in past threads) the voting on matters pertaining to the World Cup be limited only to nations who have qualified for the World Cup in the past 20 years (about 50-55 nations, if my memory serves me correctly). Or that voting on matters pertaining to the World Cup be conducted using a weighted-vote system in which every nation gets one vote, but nations which have previously qualified for the World Cup receive additional votes depending on how well they've done (for example, each time you advance out of the group stage you receive an additional vote). Such systems would ensure that the nations for whom how, when, and where the World Cup is staged is actually important (i.e. the ones who have a chance at qualifying for the actual tournament) have the voting power within FIFA to ensure that it is staged properly.
How many countries are capable of hosting a 40-team World Cup? It's tricky enough with 32. Maybe Russia is the sort of place that can. But Qatar, realistically, is only big enough to host a couple of groups or so. In amongst all the electioneering, is this aimed at turning 2022 into a shared Middle Eastern tournament, or something like that?
Congratulations, you just gave a majority of votes on where to hold the World Cup to UEFA. Say goodbye to ever having another cup outside of Europe. Having the strongest countries control things avoids one set of problems, but introduces others. Look at cricket. The ICC is controlled by the 10 "full" members, and the decisions they make are made for their benefit. It has done tremendous harm to the development of countries like Scotland and Ireland where cricket is popular, but not at the same level. Or look at the UN where the important decisions have to pass the Security Council where the five permanent members have vetoes. It suits them fine, but is not so great for other countries.
The people who vote for FIFA president aka all members and those who select the WC hosts (committee) are different. Personally I would rather have all countries vote for the next host rather than how is it now And there are not many countries capable of hosting a WC outside Europe. In fact I think there are more countries in Europe than in the ROW capable of that
Really ? There will be 6 CONMEBOL countries in the next WC and 5 CAF. And if we're using the number of semi final reached, why is CONCACAF asking for one other spot in 2018 (even without the expansion) , despite the fact that it has been taking part to every single WC (CAF has been given a full spot for the 1st time in 1970 and takes part to WC since then), hosted it three times and never reached a semi final since 1930 ??