Effect of FIFA's decision to take a spot away from Europe

Europe loses a spot because Germany is guaranteed one as host. As last WC, the host nation is taken into account when giving spots to confederations.

 

Everyone keeps saying that Europe lost a spot and that Asia gained, etc.

Actually, Europe lost HALF a spot -- as did Conmebol. Asia is UNCHANGED. Oceana and Concacaf gained half a spot each.

In J/K, the allocations were:

Europe 14.5 (1 of which was France)
Africa 5
Conmebol 4.5
Asia 4.5 (2 of which were J/K)
Concacaf 3
Oceana 0.5

In the end, Conmebol's 5th place defeated Oceana and Europe's 15th defeated Asia's 5th.

This time Europe only gets 14 (1 of which is Germany), Africa gets 5, Asia 4.5, Conmebol 4, Concacaf 3.5 and Oceana 1 with the resulting playoff between Asia and Concacaf.

Personally, I think that Europe should not have lost half a slot, I think that Africa should have lost half of one of theirs -- or even a whole one with Conmebol not losing their half slot either.


As for the consequences -- simple, one less team will qualify . How's that?

 

Nope, host counts as one of the spots (just like France counted as one of the 14.5 spots this year). Europe did not lose a spot because Germany is a host -- in fact Europe didn't lose a SPOT -- they lost half a spot.

 

What happens if Europe dominates Germany 2006??

do we get an extra place??? not bloody likely.
FIFA seems to cutting more places from UEFA and South america every cup...
The allocation is laughable...
1 for oceania!!!
5 for asia
3.5 for concacaf..

All the mickey mouse federations are gaining places for non-achievement.
oooh the yanks reached the quarter finals so lets give their joke federation another place...
I can see Jamaica reaching 2006 and coming over here and recruiting 50% of their team..
absolutely laughable..

 

US is reasonable to good (if they can prove it one more time).

But other than that?

 

England slumped to 3rd in 92/93 qualifying, and third's never qualified. Thanks Graham Taylor.

What Europe should look at is perhaps restructuring their qualifying groups. Currently you get too many uneven groups with either 2 or three strong teams fighting for 1.5 places or sometimes you get a plain weak group. Just luck of the draw, even with seeding. Maybe if there was a pre-qualifying, to eliminate some of the minnows (as happens everywhere else except S. America) you could have 5 groups of 6 where the top 3 qualify (assuming UEFA regains the 1 spot it 'lost' with Germany hosting).

 

Not really. When allocations were announced for '02, Europe had 14 spots (plus France as champions). Then Asia started whining and threatening to boycott at their perceived lack of spots given that they had two hosts. Europe graciously offered for one of its teams to play off against an Asian team for a spot. Logically that half spot should have reverted to Europe because - obviously - there aren't two Asian hosts in '06. So Europe has lost a spot and Asia has gained half a spot. Quite bizarre given the abject performances of China and Saudi Arabia in '02. Effectively Europe has been stiffed out of half a spot due to its generosity in '02 and, along with South America, has given up half a spot to allow Australia to qualify.

 

i think its a good thing as australia always win their group but then have to beat a south American team which i think is unfair as that south American team finished 4th or 5th

 

That is not unfair. Since Australia is part of such a weak confederation, it is only fair that they play a South American team to try to earn their spot in the finals. If they can't win against a 5th place team from SA then the don't deserve to go to the finals.

 

I agree that the allocation is a little off,
but in WC 2002 the record of UEFA v. the Mickey Mice (CONCACAF, AFC, Africa) in rounds 1 and 2 were (if my addition is correct):
8 wins, 7 losses & 7 ties
Pretty damn even.

The allocations for WC 2006: UEFA = 14, Mickey = 13 (14 with Oceania), pretty damn even.

Personally I'd like to see more playoffs for the last few spots. There's no way Oceania should get a full spot and Asia should have to playoff with Oceania for maybe 4 spots total.
Africa keeping 5 spots for 1 team going through is crazy, at least make them playoff for 1 or 2 of their spots!
While I am biased to my little "joke federation" CONCACAF I do think our 3.5 is viable, Mexico (beat Croatia, Ecuador and tied Italy) and US (beat Portugal, tied Korea, lost to Poland) went through and Costa Rica was only held back by goal differential to Turkey, who they tied in their group.

 

what will be the effect?

simpe answer, LOWER QUALITY WORLD CUP IN 2006

nuff said.

 

If you want to see what the effect on Europe would have been, it would have been the loss of one of the second-place teams in the groups that then qualified. If memory serves, those were: Ireland, Slovenia, Germany, Croatia, and Turkey. Two lost in the first round, one in the second round, one finished 3rd and one 2nd. Pretty sizable bunch.
Teams that would have had to play one of these teams from Asia, assuming that Europe kept a 1/2 spot and Asia lost a 1/2 spot now that it is not co-hosting: China, UAE, Iran most likely.

As for CONCACAF, I'd say that the 4th place team there deserves a shot to do as well as the 5th place CONMEBOL. Honduras, Jamaica, or Guatemala all are certainly as capable as Uruguay or Ecuador. And all of these "prestige" issues about how CONMEBOL has won 9 of the 17 Cups? Yeah, sure; you could also say that "Brazil, Argentina, and Uruguay have won 9 of the 17 Cups, while the best any other SA team has done is moderate success by Columbia/Chile, some really boring draws by Paraguay, and all in all the rest of the confederation specializes in showing up."

 

ooh, our ENTIRE CONFEDERATION DELEGATION did better in 2002 than:

France
Russia
Croatia
Slovenia
Portugal
Poland

Almost half the UEFA contigent did worse than the WORST Concacaf team that went
At least UEFA almost had as high a proportion in the R16 as Concacaf!.

Who's the mickey mouse confederation again?

Right.

 

Yes, but that would be too sensible for UEFA. After all, a sensible qualification scheme wouldn't leave the Netherlands at home, removing the source of Eurowhinging. Think Holland deserves to go? Bring them instead of pathetic Slovenia!

Guinho

 

Sence has got nothing to do with it mate.
It's all politics.

If sence had anything to do with it your lot would have been lucky to have 2 teams in j/k after the pathetic showing in '98.

 

Certainly not Europe or South America. When you look at their record against other confederations they have consistently outperformed the rest World Cup after World Cup, even in '02 when they performed less well overall than previously. And yet it's those two confederations that are giving up spots. Yes, CONCACAF did well in '02, but remember that this was on the back of a pretty abject showing in '98. Not really justification for increasing their numbers, imo.

 

One critical fallacy that is always made is comparing aggregate statistics, rather than comparing the quality of teams in their own right. It doesn't make much sense to say Slovenia has a stronger right to go than Costa Rica, just because it has Italy and Germany nearby and CR only has Mexico. In considering how many also ran Euro squads go, you have to leave out the Germanys of the world since they already have berths in the 15 or so Europe gets.

Guinho

 

Would this be the Germany that scraped into the finals via the playoffs?

13 different UEFA teams have reached the QFs in the last three World Cups - hardly an indication that UEFA's strength is narrowly based.

 

UEFA shouldn't complain since they always have 50%of the whole tournament presented.

All of you are saying that Conmebol losed just a half spot,but i must say that they lose 1,5,why?
Cause the reigning champion(Brazil)have to qualify also,but FIFA and all of us know that Brazil will qualify even if it's tough(like the last qualifiers)
But overall FIFA just gave South America three spots which is totally a discrimination.

 

CONMEBOL shouldn't complain because they still send 40% of their teams to the WC (UEFA sends 27%)

 

wc germany

Previous world cups shouldnt matter. Are those teams that won
the world cups previously the same teams now? No.
Other teams are improving.

UEFA shouldnt complain if you ask me they should have only 10-12 spots. European countries like Russia; Poland; Slovenia didnt do that well.

And yeah of course 13 countries from europe have qualified for the quarterfinals of the WC that's because they always have 50% of the teams in the tournament. Send 14 African Nations to the WC and only 5 European nations. I guarantee you that an African nations would emerge as the champion.

Qualifying for the q-finals or round of 16 means nothing. In wc2002, there were 2 european teams in almost every group; hence 2/4 chance of qualifying for the next round.

 

Yeah and Africa only send 5 teams of 52,should they get more spots?

And UEFA sends 15 teams to the tourney thats almost 50%of all countries presented.
They don't need more.

 

Re: wc germany

17 of the last 24 quarterfinalists have been European, with 13 different teams represented at least once. At 70%, that's way over what one would logically expect given that they have less than half the participants. Similarly, Europe is consistently overrepresented in 2nd round qualifiers and underrepresented in last place finishers as compared to their overall representation.