2009 Confederations Cup Question

There will be another African and CONCACAF championship before 2009, so it would be logical that the champions of the next tournaments will participate at the 2009 CC.

 

i didnt even know the tournament had been moved to every 4 years. i presume then the next time its being held in south africa?

otherwise you have to ask why sepp blatter continues with this most pointless of cups. you might think that after what happened in france in 2003 would have made minds up for certain to cancel the biggest waste of space in the footballing world.

 

The move to every 4 years was a good one, i think it is also meant to force confederations like CAF and CONCACAF to move their tournaments to a 4 year format.

 

The reason it continues is that it now acts as a dress rehearsal for the World Cup host nation. I would like to see it changed so that instead of continental champions taking part, it is used in place of inter continental playoffs to determine who makes the finals. Each confederation could send one team. I would allow UEFA 2 teams, with the hosts coming along as well to make 8 teams. Top three teams qualify (excluding the host). It would mean nearly two weeks out of the calendar but it would be better to see a tournament that means something, and after all, its only every 4 years.

 

The problem with your proposal is that the qualifying campaign will have to end half a year earlier, which is quite impossible.
Or the CC will have to be played half a year later, but in that time there is no room in the calendar.

 

Its a problem, but I would make room in the calendar for it just before the draw. There is already a week set aside for playoffs, it means extending that period by an additional week. We could sacrifice a friendly date to acheive this. As it only happens once every four years I don't see it as a major problem. Those that would make it a major problem are the same people that would like to see an end to international football altogether. It wouldn't be too hard to work club football around this break.

 

The current playoffs take one weekend and one mid-week date. Your system would take at least two weeks, meaning another two or three domestic fixtures missed. I don't see how your system would be any better than the simple two-leg playoffs.

If they're going to insist on this confederations cup, how about making it the best XI from each confederation? The member FAs in each confederation vote for a manager, who then picks a squad, with say a maximum of two from each country. Each confederation plays each other once for a five-game league.

I think language barriers might be the main problem with this, but who doesn't want to watch a European XI vs South American XI, in a non-charity game?

 

You would have to make room by not only making 2 or 3 league matchdays free, but also the schedule of the CL and UEFA-cup in that period is already very full. So there is no way to make room for the CC in November/December. And finishing the qualifying campaigns in Europe before June 2009 is also impossible with the current format with groups of at least 6 teams.

Your idea is a nice one, which would make the CC much more interesting, but there just is no way of fitting it into the football calender.

 

I agree, I really like the idea of having the Confed Cup determine the last few spots for the World Cup. However, the problem many have with this tournament already is the fixture congestion that it causes. Holding it for WC spots would be great, but the time it would need to be held at would add even more to the problem...

 

Only option to solve this problem would be to play the CC without a groupstage, so the teams will have to play 3 matches at most. In that case you can hold it in the week in November which is already scheduled for international matches by only adding one match. So let's say the matches are played on Thursday, Sunday and Wednesday in stead of Saturday and Wednesday now.
Still only one league weekend should be kept free and it won't interfere with the CL and UEFA-cup.

 

The proposals aren't bad ideas. I think anything is possible, if there is a will and a way to work things out. Probably most issues can be worked out if some whole scale soccer calendar changes would be made. But for every person interested in change which could improve the game, another is a tradionalist and therefore very few major changes (with rules or tournaments) are ever made. I for one would love the World Cup every two years. That is the single major 'national team' tournament that really gets soccer fans' blood going and even captures some interest among those who don't usually like soccer. Get rid of all the other insignicant small tournaments; just focus on contintinental cups and the World Cup and the fan has something big to look forward to every summer. The original reason it was every 4 years was not to make it a "more valued" event, it was the logistics of the day ... it was hard to organize; and players traveled months by ships.

But this is a discussion for another thread, another time.

I support anything that makes the Confederation's cup more appealing. But, it's also not bad that it consists of the confederation champions; because there should be a logical progression after winning your continent. But then again, I think that only one event should have the purpose of determining a world champion. Right now, the separation of each continental cup and the World Cup is not logical; but it would take a major schedule overhaul and working out some other issues (like host countries) in order to link them.

 

hmmm..not a big fan of the CC as a qualification cup...JMO....it is a way to get the cup to mean something, though your situation with the host is bizarre. More than likely, whoever draws the host would draw an easier squad than the A squad of a team trying to qualify.

I'd recommend it to be the midway point of the World Cup cycle, just for fun, but the Euro is right around then, so that probably wont work either. I think that its about as good as its going to be where it is...just a tourney to test the lights at the host's stadia.

as for your qualification tourney, i like the idea. If we had put together the 4 teams this cycle (T&T, Bahrain, Australia, Uruguay), send them to Germany and have a round robin 3 games and the top 2 make it. It can be done in 10 days max, and there are no away-goal rule or anything. Just duking it out.

 

Of course there is room. All you need to do is remove the friendly dates and roll them into one. It would be easy to suspend leagues for two weeks. Its all a matter of priority. It simply means that every four years some of these other tournaments would need to shift dates. Its not a problem unless you want to make it one. If UEFA are too busy to attend then their spots can go to someone who wants to be there.

 

This whole thread begs the question of why do we need a confederations cup in the first place?

I don't want to have no football to watch for two weeks because there's some mickey mouse tournament going on.

 

I dont know why everyone is hating on the CC. I find it very interesting and exciting to watch since there is not a lot of competative international soccer. I agree about adding an incentive to make it even more interesting. U could have one WC spot for grabs from the top placed team that didn't qualify for the WC.

 

I like the CC very much! It's interesting to see all the champs playing with eachother!