OFC mentioned somewhere recently that they want all members to participate in the OFC Nations Cup finals from now on, so that will change the format for WC qualifying some what from last time. It may be totally separate from the OFC Nations Cup.
https://www.fifa.com/worldcup/news/...ention-for-fifa-world-cup-qatar-2022tm-berths is titled "204 member associations in contention for FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™ berths." The pots for tomorrow's AFC draw are: "Pot 1: IR Iran, Japan, Korea Republic, Australia, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, China PR Pot 2: Iraq, Uzbekistan, Syria, Oman, Lebanon, Kyrgyz Republic, Vietnam, Jordan Pot 3: Palestine, India, Bahrain, Thailand, Tajikistan, Korea DPR, Chinese Taipei, Philippines Pot 4: Turkmenistan, Myanmar, Hong Kong, Yemen, Afghanistan, Maldives, Kuwait, Malaysia Pot 5: Indonesia, Singapore, Nepal, Cambodia, Bangladesh, Mongolia, Guam, Sri Lanka" Other details include that CAF will have a draw on 27 July that will use the FIFA Rankings that will be released on 25 July. Round 1 will be in September 2019, so 14 teams will be eliminated then, and no more than 191 teams will be left by the end of the year. CAF's Group Stage will be from March 2020 through October 2021. That's 9 pairs of matchdays, and 6 are needed for WCQs, with others used for the 2023 Africa Cup of Nations. The ten group winners will play for the five World Cup spots in November 2021. Some confederations will finish qualifying in March 2022, but CAF will finish in November 2021 and has a whole number of spots. CONMEBOL will start in March 2020. They don't have any information about UEFA or OFC.
Qatar is participating because it is doubling as qualifying for the 2023 AFC Asian Cup. Qatar cannot advance to the next round of WCQs. 7 or 8 winners and 4 of 5 second place teams advance to Round 3, which will have 2 groups of 6. If Qatar wins their group, the other 7 group winners and the best 5 second place teams advance in WCQs. If Qatar is one of the best 4 second place teams, the group winners and best 4 second place teams other than Qatar advance in WCQs. If Qatar is one of the worst 4 second place teams or finishes third or worse, nothing is changed. There is no guarantee than Qatar's group will advance anybody in WCQs. If Qatar wins their group and the second place team is not one of the best 5 second place teams, no team advances from the group. Here are AFC's groups: A: China PR, Syria, Philippines, Maldives, and Guam B: Australia, Jordan, Chinese Taipei, Kuwait, and Nepal C: Iran, Iraq, Bahrain, Hong Kong, and Cambodia D: Saudi Arabia, Uzbekistan, Palestine, Yemen, and Singapore E: Bangladesh, Oman, India, Afghanistan, and Qatar F: Japan, Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Myanmar, and Mongolia G: United Arab Emirates, Vietnam, Thaliand, Malaysia, and Indonesia H: Korea Republic, Lebanon, Korea DPR, Turkmenistan, and Sri Lanka All of the groups are listed in FIFA Ranking order except for Group E, Qatar, who can't advance in WCQs, was made E5. They are the top pot team from Group E. Bangladesh, who is listed first, is from the bottom pot. The significance is that the teams from the top pot have Matchdays 1 and 6 off, teams from the second pot have Matchdays 2 and 7 off, teams from the third pot have Matchdays 3 and 8 off, teams from the fourth pot have Matchdays 4 and 9 off, and teams from the fifth pot have Matchdays 5 and 10 off. In Group E, Bangladesh will have Matchdays 1 and 6 off, and Qatar will have Matchdays 5 and 10 off. The ten matchdays are: 5 September 10 September 10 October 15 October 14 November 19 November 26 March 31 March 4 June 9 June
The 12 teams that make the 3rd round all qualify for Asian Cup 2023. There will be an additional playoff round or two for the Asian Cup to get the final AC round down to 24 teams. Having China and Qatar involved means we wont know how many spots are available for the Asian Cup. It will be from 10 to 12. At the draw they said Qatar requested the slot change so they could compete in Copa America which starts June 12. We have also accepted an invite for that tournament which doesn't give us much time to acclimatize. Whilst different teams have risen up and made a mark in the Asian Cups it seems that the same teams keep coming out on top in World Cup Qualifying. Be interesting to see if that continues.
Very impressive indeed. 3-time Rugby WC winners and two-time finalists at the Cricket WC, as well. Australia is quite impressive, too, being slightly less successful in rugby (still 2 WC titles though), but very impressive in cricket (5-time world champs).
Recently, you would have to really stretch your definition of "slightly less successful" to include Australia. I mean, really really really really stretch that definition. J
TBF, one win and 2 finals in the last 5 WCs isn't a bad record. But yeah.. I guess there is a big gap between NZ and everyone else.
Actually CAF will get rid of 14 in September (according to https://www.fifa.com/worldcup/news/...ention-for-fifa-world-cup-qatar-2022tm-berths) so that's 206-193!! J
Yeah, but they're getting eliminated from losing a head-to-head matchup contested on a level playing field.
I posted that the CAF draw would be on 27 July (today), but I typed wrong and it will be on 29 July. The pots are: 1: Zimbabwe (112), Sierra Leone (114), Mozambique (116), Namibia (121), Angola (122), Guinea-Bissau (123), Malawi (126), Togo (128), Sudan (129), Rwanda (133), Tanzania (137), Equatorial Guinea (139), Eswatini (139 and tied with Equatorial Guinea), and Lesotho (144) 2: Comoros (146), Botswana (147), Burundi (148), Ethiopia (150), Liberia (152), Mauritius (157), Gambia (161), South Sudan (169), Chad (175), Sao Tome and Principe (185), Seychelles (192), Djibouti (195), Somalia (202), and Eritrea 9202 and tied with Somalia) Central African Republic is 111th with 1,184 ranking points. That's 10 more points than Zimbabwe who has to start earlier. In World Cup 2018 qualifying, CAF had to break a tie in the FIFA Rankings, which FIFA didn't do when teams were the same when rounded to the nearest whole number. Benin (345.46) and Libya (345.35) got the last byes, and Niger (345.31) had to play in Round 1. UEFA will decide their format on 24 September. CONMEBOL will have nine pairs of matchdays: 23-31 March 2020 31 August-8 September 2020 5-13 October 2020 9-17 November 2020 22-30 March 2021 31 May-8 June 2021 30 August-7 September 2021 4-12 October 2021 8-16 November 2021
https://www.cafonline.com/total-afr...-qualifiers-for-the-fifa-world-cup-qatar-2022 says the draw will be tomorrow at 10:00 A.M. GMT. Here is the schedule for Rounds 2 and 3: 23-31 March 2020: Game 1 1-9 June 2020: Game 2 22-30 March 2021: Games 3 and 4 30 August-7 September 2021: Game 5 4-12 October 2021: Game 6 8-16 November 2021: Both legs of the playoffs between group winners
Not a fan of CAF's qualifying format. 8 matchdays to narrow the field from 40 teams to 5 is sheer madness for a confederation with so much parity!
I agree, but here's why. They went up to two confederational tournaments per four years. Just like Concacaf used fewer matchdays because of the Nations League, CAF used fewer matchdays. However, four of the five times there are Group Stage games the teams play once rather than twice. The 2021 Africa Cup of Nations qualifying Group Stage has two pairs of games and two individual games. None of the months have one qualifier for each tournament. Combined the Group Stages are using 12 matchdays when there could be 18. For WCQs, they might think that 5 groups of 4 eliminates too many teams before the Group Stage, and there are enough matchdays for 5 groups of 6 like they used to have, but groups of 6 that qualify 1 teams have many meaningless games. The other possibility would be to have two WCQ group stages, and there are just enough matchdays for that. In that case, 10 groups of 4 would advance 2 teams each to 5 groups of 4. The first group stage would advance half of the teams, and the second one would qualify a quarter of the teams. Doing it in the opposite order and going from 40 to 10 to 5 doesn't work because 10 teams don't fit in groups of 4. Here are the draw results with the first leg home team (the bottom pot team) listed first and the FIFA Ranking gap between the teams: Ethiopia vs. Lesotho: 6 Somalia vs. Zimbabwe: 90, Zimbabwe is the best team in the round and Somalia is tied with Eritrea for the worst Eritrea vs. Namibia: 81 Burundi vs. Tanzania: 11 Djibouti vs. Eswatini*: 56 Botswana vs. Malawi: 21 Gambia vs. Angola: 39 Liberia vs. Sierra Leone: 38 Mauritius vs. Mozambique: 41 Sao Tome and Principe vs. Guinea-Bissau: 62 South Sudan vs. Equatorial Guinea: 30 Comoros vs. Togo: 18 Chad vs. Sudan: 46 Seychelles vs. Rwanda: 59 https://www.fifa.com/worldcup/news/africa-draw--qatar-2022-344-w-3045812 is titled "Early miles of African marathon to Qatar laid out." It has video of the draw, which lasted 35:11. https://www.cafonline.com/total-afr...nal-rivalries-highlight-road-to-qatar-prelims is titled "Regional rivalries highlight road to Qatar prelims."
Yes, that's the reason. Not a very good reason IMO. If they agreed to combine 2021 ACN and 2022 WC qualifying they would've given themselves a lot more options for 2022 qualifying.
With CONCACAF and AFC both having somewhat strange formats for WCQ it seems to me that some regions aren't treating the 2022 WC with respect and regard their own tournaments as more important.
It will probably affect the quality of the performances by CAF and CONCACAF teams when they play UEFA teams in 2022.
CAF especially. CAF is really risking not having their best teams qualify for Qatar. If they keep this format for 2026 when 8 or 9 CAF teams qualify, we could also see a pretty random/not very good team qualify. A team would just have to get hot for a few games, like Madagascar did last month.
It's the exact same format that was used in 2014. It's not that they aren't taking it seriously, they just aren't very forward thinking. They rejected to combine 2022 WCQ and 2021 ANCQ which I think would have been a better way to go. With a crowded schedule and with 2 separate qualifying series they had to try and make less games. But as I said this exact format was used in 2014. The big difference is that qualification comes down to the final 10 teams being drawn in a final home and away series. So technically the group stage is easier with 10 groups as opposed to 5. But the head to head final rounds are a real battle. More exciting the, but less room for error. I would prefer the AFC format which could easily be implemented and virtually ensure the best 5 teams qualify. As it is now much will depend on the FIFA rankings to figure out the head to head matchups. This will likely ensure some lopsided matchups.
The exact same format was used by CAF in 2014 and that was CAF's best ever showing overall with 2 teams advancing to the 2nd round. I dont think it will have any effect. Concacafs qualification is just utterly ridiculous and makes a mockery of the sport. Is this their way of trying to rig the US into the finals after the last debacle.
Not a fan of this format, but when we used it back in 2014 we pretty much got the best teams. Maybe Cameroon could have been replaced by Senegal. In fact the only time recently CAF didn't send a good representation of their top teams was in 2006. Where Togo and Angola somehow managed to get through. The 10 groups of 4 you aren't likely to see too many upsets, so you will likely have something very close to the top 10 teams going into the final round. The real problem will be the draw for the final head to head which I assume will be based on fifa rankings so you'd want to be in the top 5 to avoid the better teams. Currently the top 5 is Senegal, Nigeria, Tunisia, Morocco, Algeria I would say that's pretty accurate except for Tunisia
The latter being historic, as it was the last time FIFA allowed head-to-head as the first tiebreaker in WCQ group standings.
If head-to-head was still the tiebreaker, Italy's embarrassing failure to qualify might not have happened because they lost a Playoff to Sweden, who had a better goal differential and worse head-to-head against third place Netherlands. Sweden reached the World Cup 2018 Quarterfinals after winning their group, but they would have been eliminated in their qualifying group if the tiebreaker was head-to-head. Head-to-head goal differential in WCQs for 2006 gave USA first in the Hexagonal over Mexico, who had a better overall goal differential.