Thread for Developing a Statistical System for Determining WC Allocations

That may be it's best endorsement

Sachin

 

Man you overrate CAF so much.
CONMEBOL should have 5 autos and a playoff no question about it.

 

......which brings us back to square one.

32 teams. The important people at FIFA agree in the size of the cake. Now it's all about negotiating the size of the pieces for the six confederations.

There will probably be only minor changes. Asia loses 0.5 slots to CONCACAF or something like that.

 

Africa has supplied the last two Olympic champions.

On what basis should over 50% of South American qualify for the finals? Do two good sides mean that the rest should benefit from this?

 

And which are the ''good ones''in Africa compare too Argentina,Brazil?

 

I'm not trying to compare African and South American teams, I was just responding to your post.
However, if South America should be given 5.5 places, then UEFA should get over 20 places.

 

And why?
So we can see super European teams like Slovenia,Austria,Yugoslavia,Ukraine.

 

Neither Europe or South America are in position to demand more spots after the showing in Korea/Japan. If it hadn't been for some heroic last minute action from Paraguay against an already eliminated Slovenian team, only Brazil would have survived the groupstage in the last World Cup from South America.

 

If it means seeing the great South American teams such as Chile and Peru, then yes.

 

Re: Re: Thread for Developing a Statistical System for Determining WC Allocations

I don't think any confederation has any great claim for more spots after 2002.
I would say that Asia needs to prove it's worth on another continent. CONCACAF probably has the strongest claim, but it is still not that great.

 

The basis for my statistical system for WC allocation would include the following:

1-Only World Cup matches should be used to determine positions. Only in the WC do teams play with their best against other confederations. WC qualifiers should not be included in any way. The confederations use different calendars and different formats. Some do a better job than others of avoiding qualifiers in the middle of their domestic seasons than others, so comparability here is limited.

2-The primary focus of any system should be to compare teams on the "bubble" of the qualifying. For instance, if Argentina and Brazil both get 9 pts in group play in a World Cup and meet in the final, this should not bolster the notion of CONMEBOL getting 6 or 7 spots. We should be more interested in how teams 3-5 perform for CONMEBOL, because these are the teams that could be taking a place otherwise occupied by Asia #5, UEFA #16, etc. If this results in CONMEBOL or UEFA losing spots and placing their "premier" teams on the qualifying bubble next time around, it is up to those teams to take qualfying more seriously and their respective confederations to come up with a system in which fewer quirky results occur like Holland in the last qualifier. In UEFA's case, why not have some kind of prelimiary group play for the bottom half of teams so that goal difference against minnows doesn't have the potential to hurt a team? UEFA could have 6 groups of 6 with two teams automatically qualifying in each group and playoffs for number threes

3-Intraconfederation games can count or not. Statistically, it will not matter much one way or the other.

4-Politics aside, Asia and Oceania should merge. In any statistical system, if Australia got a full spot and then goes to the next World Cup and finishes with zero pts, the confederation would risk losing the spot. There is too much variation when the outcome of one team decides the fate of an entire confederation. By pooling them with Asia, the degree of variation diminishes.

My system:

Take the bottom half of each confederation and determine the average number of points for each team in group play. In the case of a confederation like UEFA with 15 teams, to get 7.5 teams, take half of the middle team's points.

The results thus far:
UEFA 7.5 Teams 19 points 2.53 avg
CONMEBOL 2.5 Teams 7 points 2.80 avg
CONCACAF 1.5Teams 6 points 4.00 avg
Africa 2.5 Teams 4 points 1.60 avg
Asia 2.0 Teams 0 points 0.00 avg

The confed. with the weakest bottom half (Asia)loses one spot to the confed with the best bottom half (CONCACAF). The next worst confed (Africa) loses 1/2 spot to CONMEBOL. Next WC, Africa # 5 plays CONMEBOL #6 for a spot. UEFA stays the same. All confederations are guaranteed 2 spots minimum. If Asia were to still do the worst with only 2 teams, then the next worst confederation would need to fork over a full spot.

The advantage to such a system is that implicitly, all results historically would be included in addition to the most recent WC. The introduction of another team from a confederation should bring the group back closer to the middle next time, reducing the chance of the same confed. making two consecutive 1 team gains. Likewise, if a confed. loses a spot, they will most likely be more competitive next WC. All confederations should converge toward the middle.

 

Thank you photar for creating a thread that is very near and dear to my heart.
First of all,If FIFA is truly a world organizing body,and OFC has full confederation status, then OFC should have a guaranteed slot, as should all other Confederations. Each confederation should have its top qualifier in the final.
Simply, each World Cup should have 8 automatic guaranteed slots. The host (no co-hosting), the holder, and 1 from each confederation.
Since 32 is an optimum number of teams for the final from a simple mathematical standpoint, we will stick with that. 32 minus 8 leaves 24 slots to fill.
My idea is this.
Whatever mathematical system you develop will be based on percentages in the final analysis. Of the remaining 24 slots, you make 18 of them automatic, which is to say, based on the percentages. (whichever percentages you choose to apply) If the realtive strengths were even, there would be 3 teams from each confederation among the 18.(6x3=18) Obviously this is not the case, but it is a simple target for each confederation to aim for. In reality UEFA would likely get half of the 18 slots, and it would go down from there. (hint. if you take the top 64 FIFA ranked teams in the world by confederation, and divide by two, you end up with numbers very close to the current slot allocation)

What about the last 6 slots? My idea would benefit on many levels, importantly monetarily, which eventually equals politically.
Based again on whatever statistical analysis you chose to use, each confederation would be assigned it's percentage of 24 playoff slots. The 24 teams would be divided into 6 groups of four, to play for the final 6 slots in the final. Winner take all in each group.
Each confederation would host one of these 6 tournaments, spreading the wealth.
Obviously you would spread the playoff qualifying teams amongst the 6 groups, so each confederation would have maximum chance of advancing. (There would likely be at least 1 UEFA team in each group, and based on current strengths at least 4 CONMEBOL's)
More importantly, these tournaments would be an excellent tune-up for the teams, and give us some excellent games. Since the tournaments are spread worldwide, each confederation benefits,and the profile of international football is raised. For some of the playoff teams, this will be "their" World Cup. I believe this to be an equitable system to decide between the mid-to low-range teams.
Not only that, these tournaments would give us some important inter-continental matches with which to adjust our rankings for the next World Cup.
Sure you will get groups with Denmark, Tunisia, Honduras, and Uzbekistan, but what better way to help the minnows? Besides, Senegal wasn't supposed to take out France in the first game of 2002.
Anything can happen, more of the world is involved, and the game gains a wider high-level exposure. Hosting one of these playoff tournaments can be a practise for one day eventually hosting the big show. Infrastructure will benefit etc.

 

Wolf6656,

In principle, I like your idea of the three tier (confederation champ, automatic qualifier, playoff) approach. However, I have a hard time giving OFC a champion a spot, I have no problem giving OFC an automatic qualifier spot (see below).

My idea is to first I would establish some overall guidelines:

• No confederation can have more than half the teams in the WC - we want it to be a world cup.
• No more than half of the teams in a confederation can make it to the WC - if you can't be in the top half of your confederation, you shouldn't get a shot at the world championship.
• Past success/failure has to be taken into account - politics and deals are not as important as on the field performance.
• Host country automatic spot is taken out of its confederation allocation - a confederation should not have a double reward "home" field advantage for the WC and an extra team.
• If the title holder gets an automatic spot (I can go either way), that spot is also taken out of its confederation allocation.
• 1998 & 2002 allocations a reasonable (best available?) starting point for calculation of future allocations.

The automatic qualifier spots will be allocated based on the inter-confederation record in the last two WC group stage, WC playoff games and the group stage of the last three Confederations cups (we might as well give some meaning to this tournament).

The process is as follows:

1. Calculate the total number of points for each confederation
2. If confederation gets a confederation champ spot count it as a spot (all except OFC)
3. Allocate one spot to each confederation
4. For each confederation, divide the number of points by the number of spots so far.
5. Allocate a spot to the confederation with the highest score, if it had not reach the max allowed.
6. Repeat steps 4 & 5 until all spots have been allocated.

I can buy the argument that the team with the best record for each confederation should not be used to calculate the confederation score.

The Playoff allocations will be done by following the above method for 16 more spots.

If I added the number of points from WC1998, WC2002, CC1999, CC2001, and CC2003 correctly we get:

Code:

          G   W   T   L   Pts  Pts(W=2)
UEFA      76  35  21  20  126   91
CONMEBOL  47  20  16  11   76   56
AFC       40  12   8  20   44   32
CAF       39   9  15  15   42   33
CONCACAF  33  10   8  15   38   28
OFC       13   3   2   8   11    8

         Spots Pts/spot Pts/(spot+1)
UEFA      1+8   14.00    12.60
CONMEBOL  1+4   15.20    (Reached max teams)
AFC       1+2   14.67    11.00
CAF       1+2   14.00    10.50
CONCACAF  1+2   12.67     9.50 
OFC       0+1   11.00     5.50

The next spot would have gone to UEFA. If we use 2 points for a win, the allocation is the same.

The 16 "last chance" spots will be allocated as follows

Code:

         Spots Pts/spot Pts/(spot+1)
UEFA     1+8+7   7.88   (Reached max teams)
CONMEBOL 1+4+0  (Reached max teams)
AFC      1+2+3   7.33      6.29
CAF      1+2+3   7.00      6.00
CONCACAF 1+2+3   6.33      5.43 
OFC      0+1+0  11.00      5.50

The next spot would have gone to AFC. If we use 2 points for a win, then CAF will have 4 "last chance" spots and CONCACAF only 2 (by a 0.04 margin).

Based on this system

• CONMEBOL gets 5 spots - hard to justify giving them more.
• OFC gets 1 and if they improve, a chance at another.
• UEFA gets at least 9, and a chance at 16 if they are that good.
• AFC CAF & CONCACAF all get 3 spots plus a chance at 3 more. If they are as good and deep as they claim they'll end up with more spots than they have today; if not, they have to improve - they got a fair chance on the field.
  
  This actually works nice for UEFA, they can have 8 qualifying groups ("trade" the champ spot for a qualifier spot). Group winners plus best 2nd place are automatic qualifiers. The other second place team go to the playoff. When a UEFA team is the host of the WC (as in 2006), they can have 7 groups. UEFA Camp + Winners are the automatic qualifiers and the second place teams go to the playoff.
  
  I like the playoff to be a "last chance" tournament of 16 teams. Four groups of four, winner gets in, 2nd place plays a one game elimination vs 3rd place for the last 4 spots. This tournament will take place at the sites of the WC during Oct/Nov before the WC over a two week period. if this is done, no teams from the same confederation (other than UEFA) can be in the same group and no more than 2 UEFA teams can be in the same group.
  
  The problem with the "Last Chance" tournament that it adds 1-2 games to the qualifying process. An alternative is to have these 16 teams play a home & home as they do today, but instead of playing the playoffs intra-confederation, make it an inter-confederation affair. The "first" game should be CAF-AFC (they have higher score than CONCACAF), the remaining seven teams should play against the UEFA representatives.

 

Sagy said, "However, I have a hard time giving OFC a champion a spot, I have no problem giving OFC an automatic qualifier spot (see below)."

I don't see a whole lot of difference between giving OFC one in the first column, or in the second column. When I run your system in Excel, If I give OFC one in the first column, they don't earn one in the second column anyway. (so what's the difference, either way they get one)

Sagy said, "No confederation can have more than half the teams in the WC - we want it to be a world cup."

I agree with that. UEFA cannot have more than 16.

Sagy said, "No more than half of the teams in a confederation can make it to the WC - if you can't be in the top half of your confederation, you shouldn't get a shot at the world championship."

I agree that no Confederation should have more than half of its teams in the direct qualifying (automatic) section. However, if they qualify by the statistical method into the playoff section, then I say let them. They still have to prove themselves against the others in the playoff, and we might finally settle some arguments over time. Besides, letting them into the playoff round, will give us another set of games to use in our calculation for the next WC.

Sagy said, "Host country automatic spot is taken out of its confederation allocation - a confederation should not have a double reward "home" field advantage for the WC and an extra team. and If the title holder gets an automatic spot (I can go either way), that spot is also taken out of its confederation allocation."

Upon reflection, you are correct. The host and holder take the first available slots for their respective confederations. (guaranteed entry). Then the rest of the qualifiers filter in afterwards.

Sagy said, "The automatic qualifier spots will be allocated based on the inter-confederation record in the last two WC group stage, WC playoff games and the group stage of the last three Confederations cups (we might as well give some meaning to this tournament). "

Why not count the playoffs in the Confederations cups? If you're going to give the Confed Cup some meaning, then give it all some meaning.

As far as the process of your method goes, I like it except where you occasionally have two teams with the same number of points remaining. (If it were for the last slot, how would you decide which team to give it to?)
A way to help avoid this is to take the total points, and add to it the average points per game played. The average is a number between 0 and 3, so it won't make that much difference to the total, but will give added decimal places to help avoid ties.

Sagy said, "The Playoff allocations will be done by following the above method for 16 more spots."

I still like 24 automatic and 8 playoff spots. But I like 32 teams in the playoff round. 8 groups of 4. Bottom 2 of each group are out. Top 2 advance to a round of 16 to be played in World Cup host country in Oct./Nov. of year before World Cup.

I got different totals for points, even using the same games as you. I was using 1 point each for knockout games decided by penalties, instead of 3 for penalty win and 0 for penalty loss. The game after all was a draw.

Sagy said. "The problem with the "Last Chance" tournament that it adds 1-2 games to the qualifying process. An alternative is to have these 16 teams play a home & home as they do today, but instead of playing the playoffs intra-confederation, make it an inter-confederation affair. The "first" game should be CAF-AFC (they have higher score than CONCACAF), the remaining seven teams should play against the UEFA representatives."

The real problem is the various confederation methods for qualifying. While I realize they all have different numbers of teams to work with, there should still be a standard method to eliminate the minnows, before getting down to business. This is where we eliminate the excess game load.
I will have more on that topic later.

All in all, I like your idea, it is elegant, and gives whole numbers. I would just make the changes noted.

 

First, thanks for the feedback and comments.

You are 100% correct, my statement was an emotional one. It really makes no difference.

I have a problem with this, other than the philosophical considerations, there are practical ones - 5 CONMEBOL teams get automatic qualifier spots and 4-5 more go to the playoff? This feels wrong.

In the long run it make little difference, so I can go either way. My logic was to not give a confederation additional credit due to the success of it's top teams.

I solved it by giving to the confederation with the least number of spots. Your idea is brilliant! I love it.

The problem with 32 teams is that you are starting to get low level teams - OFC will have 2 PO spots, AFC & CAF 8 and CONCACAF 7. Are we really interested in giving the 10th, 11th teams from these confederations a second chance?
Even if we let the other 5 CONMEBOL teams into the playoffs (every team is in!), we end up with 9th, 10th place teams from AFC, CAF and CONCACAF.

I only looked at the group stage and WCQ playoffs (e.g. Iran-Ireland, Australia-Uruguay) - I ignored the knockout games. There is also a probability that I made a mistake counting . Can you please send me your numbers.

I couldn't agree more.
What are your ideas?

 

photar74,

I too would like statistics to be used to determine WC Finals place allocation but FIFA politics have ALREADY tainted the use of any such historical data.

The problem with this proposal is that the last two WC Finals were played by 32 teams coming from confederation allocations ALREADY DETERMINED by FIFA politics (eg the FIFA backflip on Oceania direct qualification). If the qualification path is constrained (look up the true meaning of the word before flaming me) by such FIFA politics then evidence of PAST attendance & performance at the finals is not a valid argument/methodology in determing the NEXT WC Finals place allocations.

The argument is very much like the British courts now allowing evidence to be used (in a British trial of British citizens on British laws) obtained by a third country (USA) alledgedly using torture (in camp GITMO). The evidence is palpably UN-RELIABLE and should NEVER be used in the British courts.

Likewise any WC Finals statistics used emanating from the previous two WC Finals are also equally UN-RELIABLE and should NEVER be used for determining the next WC Finals place allocation. Should such evidence be used, then it will only PERPETUATE the previous situation and would not promote the stated outcome of a fairer (my interpretation of your intent) allocation of WC Finals places IN THE FUTURE.

That all said & done, I very much like the idea of a different method of allocation of the WC Finals places.

 

RichardL,

FWIW.

In the 1994 WC Finals playoffs, Argentina (with Maradonna in the team) finished in the playoff place for CONMEBOL and had to overcome Australia (1-1 & 1-0).

They just made it into the WC Finals.

 

Here are the numbers I get from the various tournaments.
Note: In playoffs, 3 points for a win in either 90 minutes or 120 minutes or
Golden Goal.
1 point for a penalty shootout win or loss (the match ends in a draw)
(the victory comes in a completely different type of game)
1 point for a draw

(sorry these columns are all so tidy in Excel, but fall apart in straight text)

Groups - playoffs
wc98 W D L gp pts - W D L gp pts
UEFA 15 11 5 31 56 - 5 2 1 8 17
CAF 3 6 6 15 15 - 0 0 1 1 0
CONM 7 5 3 15 26 - 1 2 3 6 5
CONC 2 2 5 9 8 - 0 0 1 1 0
AFC 1 2 9 12 5 - 0 0 0 0 0
OFC 0 0 0 0 0 - 0 0 0 0 0

Groups - playoffs
wc02 W D L gp pts - W D L gp pts
UEFA 12 9 10 31 45 - 6 1 6 13 19
CAF 3 6 6 15 15 - 1 0 1 2 3
CONM 6 4 5 15 22 - 4 0 1 5 12
CONC 4 3 2 9 15 - 0 0 1 1 0
AFC 4 2 6 12 14 - 1 1 3 5 4
OFC 0 0 0 0 0 - 0 0 0 0 0

Groups - playoffs
CC03 W D L gp pts - W D L gp pts
UEFA 4 1 1 6 13 - 2 0 0 2 6
CAF 2 1 0 3 7 - 1 0 1 2 3
CONM 3 1 2 6 10 - 0 0 2 2 0
CONC 0 1 2 3 1 - 0 0 0 0 0
AFC 1 0 2 3 3 - 0 0 0 0 0
OFC 0 0 3 3 0 - 0 0 0 0 0

Groups - playoffs
CC01 W D L gp pts - W D L gp pts
UEFA 2 0 1 3 6 - 2 0 0 2 6
CAF 1 0 2 3 3 - 0 0 0 0 0
CONM 1 2 0 3 5 - 0 0 2 2 0
CONC 0 1 5 6 1 - 0 0 0 0 0
AFC 4 1 1 6 13 - 1 0 1 2 3
OFC 2 0 1 3 6 - 1 0 1 2 3

Groups - playoffs
CC99 W D L gp pts - W D L gp pts
UEFA 1 0 2 3 3 - 0 0 0 0 0
CAF 0 2 1 3 2 - 0 0 0 0 0
CONM 3 2 1 6 11 - 1 0 1 2 3
CONC 4 1 1 6 13 - 2 0 0 2 6
AFC 1 1 1 3 4 - 0 0 2 2 0
OFC 0 0 3 3 0 - 0 0 0 0 0

Here are the grand totals.....
I take the pts. and divide by gp(games played) to get the average points per game.
(I realize I should say match instead of game, but it's my hockey background, I revert to hockey terminology)
The total is pts. plus average.
You can see that it changes the relative values of the numbers very little, but adds those critical decimal places to differentiate between numbers that are very close.
Besides that, average is a valid measure of performance with which to differential between equal totals.

CONF W - D - L - gp - pts - ave - total
UEFA 29 - 11 - 20 - 60 - 98 - 1.633 - 99.633
CONM 18 - 9 - 14 - 41 - 63 - 1.537 - 64.537
AFC 12 - 5 - 16 - 33 - 41 - 1.242 - 42.242
CONC 10 - 6 - 11 - 27 - 36 - 1.333 - 37.333
CAF 8 - 9 - 11 - 28 - 33 - 1.179 - 34.179
OFC 3 - 0 - 8 - 11 - 9 - 0.818 - 9.818
TOTALS 280 - 287.742

The numbers on the bottom line are totals for those columns.
I calculated each confederation's percentage of the total for both columns, and came out with almost identical percentages,

Confed - pct. of pts. - pct. of total
UEFA - 35.00% - 34.63%
CONM - 22.50% - 22.43%
AFC - 14.64% - 14.68%
CONC - 12.86% - 12.97%
CAF - 11.79% - 11.88%
OFC - 3.21% - 3.41%

so the addition of the average to the points does not change things in the macro, but only in the micro.

Is there a limit to the length of a post? I think I will post this and continue in another post.

 

Ok,now we answer a few of our questions.
You had a problem giving Oceania (Australia) a direct qualifying slot.
On the one hand, based on strict merit, so do I.
On the other hand if FIFA wants to call it a confederation then that's what it is.
Regardless of that, I tweaked your system just a little bit and found that we don't have to give anyone a guaranteed slot.

Let's set up our spreadsheet....
Set up your columns. Here are the headings
Confederation,
Points plus average,
Start,
Direct slots,
Playoff slots,
Total slots,
Calculation,
Remainder.

Under Confederation we list the 6 confederations.
Under Start we enter the number 1 for each confederation.
We leave direct slots, and playoff slots emtpy for now.
Under calculation we put the formula "= start + direct slots + playoff slots"
Under remainder we put the formula "= Points plus average / calculation

The tweak here is that the start column is not an allocation of slots, it is just a number to avoid division by zero in the remainder column.

Now we compare remainders and enter a 1 in the direct slots column beside the appropriate confederation.
We continue adding 1 to each confederation's direct slots until we reach 24 total direct slots.

Now there are rules as you stated.
1. No confederation (Conmebol) can have more than half of its teams directly qualify for the World Cup Final. Conmebol reaches its maximum at 5.
(And that goes for you too Oceania, you can't have more than 6. ;-P )
2. No confederation can have more than 1/3 of the total direct slots. (8)
Here is the logic/philosophy.
There are six confederations. If all things were equal they would each have 1/6th of the slots. All things are not equal, but in order to provide some sense of balance, we limit direct participation to 2/6ths (1/3 = 2 confeds worth)

Note: Conmebol reaches its maximum (5) at the 19th slot.
UEFA reaches it maximum (8) at the 20th slot.
Oceania sneaks in at number 24.

Here are the results....
Confederation Direct Slots slot number
UEFA 8 1,3,7,9,12,15,17,20
CONMEBOL 5 2,8,10,16,19
AFC 4 4,11,18,23
CAF 3 5,13,21
CONCACAF 3 6,14,22
OFC 1 24
total 24

These are the teams that qualify directly for the World Cup Final.
They are the cream of their respective crops.

Now we start entering numbers in the playoff slots column using the same procedure.
The rules are slightly different, and here's where we find our talking points.
These slots are playoff slots.
The teams that find themselves in this column will have to reach this level in their confederation's qualifying round.
These teams will have to playoff in groups against the other confederations teams to qualify for the World Cup Final.
We will get some lesser teams in here. Some of these teams have little hope of making it past this round, but upsets happen. That's why they play the matches. (Senegal vs France in 2002.) You might get a Solomon Islands in here, but you may also get Denmark, Ireland, Uruguay. You may find China PR, Iraq, Canada.
You will not likely find Brazil, Argentina, England, Italy, France etc. in the playoff round, but then again you might if they don't send their best to their opening round of qualifiers.
The important point is participation. Each confederation will feel that it was given a fair chance to qualify. I hope to put an end to the bickering.
As to the number of teams, I chose 32. It gives us a familiar format to bring us down to the 8 teams required. We could do it with 24. That point is open to discussion.

The rules are
1. No confederation can have more than 1/3 of the playoff slots.
2. No confederation can have its direct slots plus its playoff slots total more than 16.

I feel that Conmbebol's bottom 5 should be allowed in here if the numbers decide they belong. I realize your philisophical view on this, and I understand it. My point is this. They still have to WIN the playoff to qualify for the final.
But if the confederation is that strong, then let them go.
If we let them in, then rule 3 is obvious. No confederation can send more teams than it actually has.

Here are the numbers...
Confederation Direct Slots slot number
UEFA 8 1,3,6,9,11,14,17,19
CONMEBOL 5 2,5,10,13,18
AFC 7 8,15,21,24,27,30,32
CAF 6 4,12,20,23,28,31
CONCACAF 5 7,16,22,26,29
OFC 1 25

If you only want 24 in the playoff you can delete the slot numbers above 24.
Conmebol reached its limit at number 18, UEFA at number 19.
OFC snuck in at number 25.

The interesting thing is that if you took my percentages from the previous post, and multiply them by the number of total slots (e.g. 24) you end up with the same number of slots per confederation, however this method puts them in order.
We could also use the order of slots to assign teams to their groups.
I have to go now, but I will finish this later.

 

I looked at the previous post later on and realized that it wasn't very clear.
I didn't have time to preview before submitting.
Posts look a lot different when they are posted than they do when you are typing them.

DIRECT SLOT RESULTS....
Confederation - Direct Slots - slot number order
UEFA - Direct Slots 8 - slot number order 1,3,7,9,12,15,17,20
CONMEBOL - Direct Slots 5 - slot number order 2,8,10,16,19
AFC - Direct Slots 4 - slot number order 4,11,18,23
CAF - Direct Slots 3 - slot number order 5,13,21
CONCACAF - Direct Slots 3 - slot number order 6,14,22
OFC - Direct Slots 1 - slot number order 24
total - Direct Slots 24

Using July 04 FIFA rankings, and just taking the teams in order, we would have directly qualified the following teams....
France, Spain, Czech Republic, Netherlands, England, Italy, Turkey, Germany.
Brazil, Argentina ,Paraguay ,Uruguay ,Colombia .
Korea Republic, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Japan .
Cameroon, Nigeria, Senegal .
Mexico, USA, Costa Rica .
Australia

PLAYOFF SLOT RESULTS...
Confederation - Playoff Slots - slot number order
UEFA 8 - slot number order 1,3,6,9,11,14,17,19
CONMEBOL 5 - slot number order 2,5,10,13,18
AFC 7 - slot number order 8,15,21,24,27,30,32
CAF 6 - slot number order 4,12,20,23,28,31
CONCACAF 5 - slot number order 7,16,22,26,29
OFC 1 - slot number order 25

We could also use the order of slots to assign teams to their groups.

In other words if you had 32 (8 groups of 4)
Group A would contain the teams from slots number 1, 9, 17, and 25.
Group B could be teams from slot 2, 10, 18, 26
but no, that doesn't work because Group A would have 3 UEFA's (1,9,17)
and group B would have 3 CONMEBOLs.(2,10,18)
(ok forget that idea)
Seeding and drawing teams for these groups might take some thought.
You could assign slot numbers 1 thru 8 into the 8 groups A-H,
A-1 UEFA, B-2 CONM, C-3 UEFA, D-4 CAF,
E-5 CONM, F-6 UEFA, G-7 CONC, H-8 AFC

then take #9 UEFA and fit it into the first group it fits into, (it can't go into A because there is already a UEFA there, but it will fit into B.
#10 CONM will fit into A, #11 UEFA won't fit C but goes into D,
#12 CAF will fit C etc. etc.
So using that method, the groups would be as follows
(I am using July 04 FIFA rankings to name a country likely to be in that position. July 04 FIFA rank in brackets.()

GROUP A-
slot1 (UEFA's9th ranked team), Portugal (12)
slot10 (CONMEBOL's 8th ranked team), Chile (66)
slot20 (CAF's 6th ranked team), Tunisia (35)
slot25 (OFC's #2 team) New Zealand (83)
Portugal had better win this.

GROUP B -
2 (CONMEBOL 6th), Ecuador (37)
9 (UEFA #12), Ireland (16)
21 (AFC #7), Bahrain (51)
26 (CONCACAF #7), Cuba (66)
Ireland should win, but there could be a surprise.

GROUP C-
3 (UEFA #10), Greece (14)
12 (CAF #5), Egypt (34)
18 (CONMEBOL #10), Bolivia (99)
27 (AFC #9), Kuwait (56)
Greece I suppose.

GROUP D-
4 (CAF #4), Morocco (31)
11 UEFA#13), Sweden (19)
22 (CONCACAF#6), Trinidad and Tobago (63)
30 (AFC #10), Oman (58)
Should be Sweden, but never count out Trinidad.

GROUP E-
5 (CONMEBOL 7), Venezuela (50)
14 (UEFA 14), Croatia (23)
23 (CAF 7), South Africa (39)
32 (AFC 11), Thailand (64)
Croatia and South Africa might be a good match.

GROUP F-
6 (UEFA 11), Denmark (15)
13 (CONMEBOL 9), Peru (75)
24 (AFC 8), Qatar (54)
29 (CONCACAF 8), Guatemala (88)
I'm a Denmark fan ok, so don't even ask me who will win this one.

GROUP G-
7 (CONCACAF 4), Jamaica (49)
15 (AFC 6), Iraq (43)
17 (UEFA 15), Belgium (24)
28 (CAF 8), Mali (46)
The closest battle so far, it depends on which Belgium shows up.

GROUP H -
8 (AFC 5), Jordan (40)
16 (CONCACAF 5), Honduras (54)
19 (UEFA 16), Russia (26)
31 (CAF 9), Zimbabwe (46)
Anyone's game the way Russia plays in tournaments.

Ok, the groups may not be lined up like this, but these are the types of teams that make this playoff round. It really looks like a tune-up session for the European teams, but surprises do happen. The point is that the teams that advance from here into the final have earned it fair and square, and I don't want to hear any complaining about slot allocations.
I you can't advance out of this playoff round, then you shouldn't be in the final anyway.

If the top 2 teams go to a round of 16, 8 winners go to the World Cup Final, 8 losers spend 4 years complaining about the state of refereeing.
The 16 3rd and 4th place teams go home and discuss how to take their game to the next level.
What we have done is give more teams a chance, (including 2 extra UEFA teams) than would have had a chance in the current setup.
What I like about the playoff round, is the fact that more countries get to participate in important international tournament play than would ever have the chance otherwise. It has to improve the quality of play simply by increased interest alone. Increased interest means greater participation, effort and development.

The real thing here is that the confederations ALL get a greater chance to put teams into the final. I am really sick of the bickering every 4 years about who got screwed out of a slot.
I know it seems wrong that all 10 teams from CONMEBOL got a chance at going to the final, but remember the bottom 5 have a tough road to get there, and if they make it, they deserve it.
The same goes for the European teams. It is possible that they could have 16 teams in the final, but remember 8 of those teams had to beat intercontinenal competition to get there. Surely, looking at the groups it looks likely they could have that many, but that is this years numbers. Next time around as the game improves in Asia, Africa and elsewhere, Europe may find they get fewer teams through to the final.

We all want the final to be a great spectacle, to do that we need the best teams, but we also need the intercontinental flavour. I feel the playoff round accomplishes that.

Next we have to work on the confederation's qualifying methods. We have to reduce the number of games, yet still get the best teams to go through.

CONMEBOL's Grand Ligua scheme is excessive. 18 games each?
A draw into 2 groups of five seems better, (8 games each) plus playoffs.
A1 and B1 bye,
A2 vs B3, A3 vs B2, (losers play for 5th and 6th)

winner of the A2 game vs B1,
winner of B2 game vs A1
losers of these two games play for 3rd, 4th, winners play for 1st-2nd.

10 games maximum
Tomorrow I will look at Concacaf