Nice draw! Aside from Group G being slightly easier than the other two, (USA doesn't get the toughest group for once!) I think these are pretty even. Can't call any of these a "Group of Death" since there's a clear weak team in each group (RSA, ZIM, and COL).
So... they've practically guaranteed that 1 of the top 3 will be gone after quarterfinals again. They're not very good at this.
They had a good WC-15, yes - but that was them on a good run, not on a typical run. Heck, I wouldn't even have called it a run - they had one shock upset and otherwise performed exactly as expected.
yeah, for once the Groups are actually balanced & the USA looks like it got the easier draw. Based on the draw here's my predictions: GROUP E 1. Brazil 2. Sweden 3. China 4. South Africa GROUP F 1. Germany 2. Australia 3. Canada 4. Zimbabwe GROUP G 1. USA 2. France 3. Colombia 4. New Zealand QUARTERFINALS Brazil def. Colombia USA def. Canada Germany def. France Australia def. Sweden SEMIFINALS Brazil def. USA Germany def. Australia BRONZE MEDAL USA def. Australia GOLD MEDAL Germany def. Brazil
A bit more justifiable since it's the Olympics, smaller tournament to start with, so teams get squeezed out easier. Also, the draw is supposed to be random. Not really their fault. It was a 50% chance of it happening from the start once all qualified teams were known.
Really? I know Brazil is hosting, but it certainly didn't help the men two years ago! And they were closer to Germany men or Netherlands men than Brazil women are to USA women.
Whoever finishes 2nd in group F has got an easier route to the final than who finishes 1st, yes? But at least both cant face the US(1st G) before the final and vice versa.
Yeah, the group F winner is on one side of the bracket, while the E & G winners are together on the other side. Both face another runner-up, though, so whether F1 and F2 has the easier route depends on E2 (any one except RSA, really) or G2 (likely France) is more difficult (likely France).
Dagnabbit! I knew we'd have to play in Manaus. I haven't done the calculations, but I'll be curious to see the travel miles logged by each country - for both men's and women's teams. Probably only US remembers this, but our men had to travel the most miles of any team in 2014. (Of course, our men don't have to worry about that this time
The US had a 50/50 chance of playing in Manaus. Since the US was going to be seeded, we were either going to be F1 or G1, and G1 plays in Manaus while F1 does not. It'll be Brazil and South Africa and US and Colombia playing in Manaus. Brazil and South Africa will travel a bit further since Belo Horizonte is slightly closer to Manaus than Rio (unless you have to route back through Rio flights-wise...not sure how that works.)
It actually was not a 50% chance of happening. They could've avoided it just by changing the knockout bracket by having F1 playing E2 instead of G2. Easy fix that they have full control over with no "draw" required.
And now the schedule is updated with the teams filled in: http://resources.fifa.com/mm/docume...io_matchschedulemix_fifa_14042016_neutral.pdf
Hence why I said "once all qualified teams were known". The bracket structure was decided well before then.
you & FIFA are two pees in the pod! group G is WAY easier than the other two. Besides winning two recent friendlies vs Netherlands, Canada won over Brazil recently at the Algarve Cup finale, yet the Brazilians probably goes in as the 1st seed at group G and only get to face the 3rd Euro & 2nd seeded Asia teams. In the meantime, the top seeds from the toughest confederations(Asia & Europe) got to be stuck in the same group together as well with the surging Canadians(who I pointed out all ready, beat the 1 seed from group G at the AC). In all fairness, Herdman(Canada) does deserve his 3rd place seed, he could of tried to beat the US at the Concacaf final, instead he started his B team. What's not deserving is that Germany & Australia gets stuck with them as Canada is a very physical team, prone to causing injuries with their roughhouse tactics. Colombia is nowhere near their WC level; the players haven't been paid in several months & easily their top player, Lady Andrade, as well as others have gotten into a spat with their coach, and didn't compete in the recent friendlies where they got promptly wiped out, 7-0, 3-0 NZ simply looked atrocious in their last games, they lost quite easily in a recent friendly vs Netherlands as well as got beat by Iceland in the game for 3rd place at the watered down Algarve Cup. At that tournament, they only could manage a tie with Russia(who promptly got beat 5-0 by Belgium in their next game). Due to ACL injury, their best player(as well as the only that can apparently score a goal) Hannah Wilkerson is out right now. Not sure if she can recover in time for the Olympics
Group G is USA/France/NZ/Colombia. Only group to have less than three of the Top 12. I think you need to re-evaluate your discussion here, since it sounds like you're talking about group E.
my bad, so you actually think USA & France's group is slightly easier than Brazil's?(even though the US & France are higher ranked than Brazil)
Yeah, though I can definitely understand the opposite view. It becomes a question of whether you think having two top5 teams or having three top12 teams is "tougher". My rule of thumb is "however many spots are available in the next round, that number +50% are the teams that can reasonable expect to advance" so with 8 teams in a QF, I think all teams ranked 12 and above have a reasonable expectation of advancing, so having three of those teams in a group makes it tougher to me. USA and France, for example, are much more likely locks to advance from their group. Also, I expect Brazil and China to perform above their current ratings, Brazil because they're hosting and China because they're a team on the rise (so their official rating is likely lower than their true strength).
I am glad to see that the women's final is slated for the Maracana Stadium, one of the storied stadiums of world soccer. And, since its reconfiguration leaves its seating capacity at around 74,000 (Wikipedia lists the attendance for the 2014 WC final as 74,738 and one has to presume that it was a sellout), this means that the US will continue to have the record for largest attendance at a women's soccer game (90,185, 1999 WWC final). The record set at the 2012 Olympics (80,203) in the final between the US and Japan will stand as an Olympic record for at least one more cycle. If my memory serves, the second-most highly attended women's olympic soccer match was the '96 final, with over 76,000 at Sanford Stadium in Georgia. Third was the Great Britain - Brazil first round match at Wembley in 2012, which drew over 70,000.
So there's another possible explanation for why the men's tournament has 16 and the women are still at 12 teams (but still related to the other in limiting the total number of athletes): Here's the answer I got from someone who'd know on why Olympic soccer has 16 men's teams but only 12 women's teams. pic.twitter.com/PDhItn6RGX— Subscribe to GrantWahl.com (@GrantWahl) April 14, 2016
We're less than 100 days away! I like the optimism of this summary of the current situation(s) in Brazil. Despite all odds, Brazil might actually pull off the Olympics.
I don't think this was ever posted in this thread. The referees for the women's Olympic tournament were announced a couple of months ago: http://resources.fifa.com/mm/docume...stantrefereesappointedoftsrio2016_neutral.pdf
Is there being some turn-over in women-referees world also? I notice that the number of names I am familiar with are less and less with every tournament. Ok, there are some "high profile" names as Chenard, Venegas, Monzul, etc. (and I guess one of them will get the final match), but there are also some referees I seldom heard about...