I would think the first contingancy plan would be to eliminate the semi-final groups, and play the semi's as a home-and-home. That would eliminate four matchdates from the schedule. You could eliminate the first-round groups, and play two rounds of home-and-home. That would eliminate two matchdates. A little more far-fetched would be to eliminate the hexagonal, and send the three semi-final group winners to the WC, and have some kind of three-team playoff for the fourth playoff bid. If you play this as a single round-robin (neutral grounds), then you cut seven matchdates. (Although, that would be my least favorite option.) I really don't like the fact that the qualifying is slated for 24 matchdates (6 first round, 6 sem-final, 10 final, 2 playoff).
I have the great good fortune to write for a website called Planet World Cup, at www.planetworldcup.com My own analysis of the proposed CONCACAF system is there, if anyone's interested in really detailed nerdy stuff. Peter Goldstein
It's a joke.... The fact is that this qualifying system, like most of everything else run by CONCACAF, is a joke...countries like Mexico & the USA should have to play 10-12 qualifying matches maximum. The problem is that the smaller countries want as many matches as possible in order to make money, and that there are more of them than there are big countries. The same thing is true about CONMEBOL, which could have easily had a 10-date, two groups of five teams, qualifying structure if it had chosen to do so. However, the smaller countries pushed for the bloated eighteen match home and home system and got it.
gohb- Your website analysis is excellent (I love that geeky stuff), and I agree with your premise that this new format for 2006 is just a $$$ game for the smaller confederations. I think that you could solve a lot of the problem of getting more qualifiers for the minnows and super-minnows by having them play each other in 6-8 team groups in a home- and -home round robin that would offer, say, even more games than the prelim round proposed this time around. You'd get your Netherlands Antilles, Suriname, St. Kitts, etc. together and let them play more games against each other, and avoid having them get pounded by the US fourth-string. Mexico, USA, and Costa Rica (Pot B) should get a bye, as well as Honduras , T&T, and Jamaica (Pot B). But Mexico, USA, and Costa Rica should get seeded separately and higher than the latter 3. You could have larger groups in the second round, and have Pots A & B get distributed amongst, say, 3 groups (1 in each group) and have the preliminary round winners and maybe the runner's up get distributed into the 3 groups by their finish. Your thoughts?
USWins06-- Thanks for the kind words. Putting together a good CONCACAF system is really hard. Some sort of preliminaries are needed for the superminnows. Your idea of larger groups is a good one, but I wonder whether these teams can afford to travel to so many games. How about giving a bye to the top 9 teams in the confederation (the 6 Hexagonal teams plus the 3 third-place teams from last cycle's semifinals) which leaves you with 26. Put them into 6 groups: 4 groups of 4 and 2 groups of 5, with the 6 winners moving on. That leaves you with 15, which is probably the absolute maximum for competitive groups. Put the 15 teams in 3 groups of 5 in a semifinal round, with the 3 qualifiers from last cycle seeded into the 3 groups, and teams 4-6 from the Hexagonal seeded into the groups as well. It might look like this: USA Jamaica El Salvador Cuba St. Vincent Mexico Honduras Canada Haiti St. Kitts & Nevis Costa Rica Trinidad & Tobago Guatemala Panama Surinam These groups aren't too bad, and you could have the top two teams from each group go into the Hexagonal. Actually, as I look at this system, it might be better than the one I proposed in the website piece, because it makes sure that the middling teams get games as well.
AP Reports Revised WC Qualify Format http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tm...1/ap_on_sp_so_ne/soc_wcup_qualifying_concacaf The biggest news... Under the new format, 20 Caribbean nations will play home-and-home, total-goals series in the Caribbean portion of the preliminary round, with games Feb. 18 and March 31 The 10 winners will advance along with Belize and Nicaragua to the mixed-zones portion of the round, and those 12 nations will play home-and-home series against the 12 teams that made it in the semifinals of qualifying for the 2002 World Cup, among them the United States. Those games will be played June 12-13 and June 19-20.
ESPN/SoccerNet also has the new plan online: http://soccernet.espn.go.com/headlinenews?id=282031&cc=5901 It looks like it's time to relax about January/February plans to follow the National teams to the Caribbean.
The latest plan for CONCACAF Qualitying from AP (Yahoo.com and soccernet.com) is that twenty Caribbean teams will match up for a home and away, then the remaining 24 teams will match up for a home and away. The surviving 12 teams will go to the semifinals. See: http://soccernet.espn.go.com/headlinenews?id=282031&cc=5901
The latest plan for CONCACAF Qualitying from AP (Yahoo.com and soccernet.com) is that twenty Caribbean teams will match up for a home and away, then the remaining 24 teams will match up for a home and away. The surviving 12 teams will go to the semifinals. See: http://soccernet.espn.go.com/headlinenews?id=282031&cc=5901
That is huge news! I must admit, I was probably in the minority for looking forward to the original plan. Any idea if they still plan on drawing the whole thing out on December 5 (or doing subsequent draws after each round).
Re: AP Reports Revised WC Qualify Format At the bottom of that article "Also Friday, Blazer and the U.S. Soccer Federation said the United States had turned down an invitation to play in next summer's Copa America, the championship of South America." So I guess that confirms that the Us is not going to the Copa America.
My only complaint.... ...is the same one I have every time....why don't them use a two-legged tie to reduce the field from 12 teams to 6 teams instead of using four-team groups. This would knock four matches off the total, meaning that teams would have to play 14 matches instead of 18.
Because two-game ties cause upsets, while six-game pools generally do a better job of getting the best teams through. Imagine Barbados beats Costa Rica as they did last time and then have a one-game run our bags off, stick 11 men in our penalty area chance to knock Costa Rica out of the competition. One home-and-away is pretty dicey, plus you're having a home-and-away against decent teams to boot. If I were American wouldn't fancy a home-and-away with Guatemala just to get to the hex, if my boys didn't have their shooting boots on at home. I don't mind the change, but to go further and eliminate the semifinal round is foolish IMO. cheers, hobbes PS I was looking forward to a February holiday in the sun as well. Oh well.
Re: Official Posting? It has not been "officially" accepted, though this is CONCACAF's proposal and FIFA usually accepts the Confederation's proposal for its own qualifying system. The draw will still occur on 5 December. I'm wondering will the 12 Nations that receive the "bye" know who they will face on 5 Dec. or will there be another draw in March? example... St. Lucia plays Bahamas. The winner plays the USA?
Re: Re: Official Posting? My original question was, if this was Concacaf's proposal, I had not seen it posted on their site, so it was still in the "reported by the media" stage. It was posted today: http://www.concacaf.com/view_article.asp?id=2235 CONCACAF World Cup 2006 Qualifying Schedule 2004 Preliminary Round 18 February – Leg 1 31 March – Leg 2 Second Round 12-13 June – Leg 1 19-20 June – Leg 2 Semi-Final Round 18 August – Game 1 4-5 September – Game 2 8 September – Game 3 9-10 October – Game 4 13 October – Game 5 17 November – Game 6 2005 Final Round 9 February – Game 1 26-27 March – Game 2 30 March – Game 3 4-5 June – Game 4 8 June – Game 5 17 August – Game 6 3-4 September – Game 7 7 September – Game 8 8-9 October – Game 9 12 October – Game 10 Fourth-Place Playoff 12 November – Leg 1 16 November – Leg 2
Re: Re: Re: Official Posting? Just to clear up any questions.... CONCACAF World Cup 2006 Qualifying Schedule 2004 Preliminary Round 18 February – Leg 1 --> FIFA Date 31 March – Leg 2 --> FIFA Date Second Round 12-13 June – Leg 1 --> Takes place during EURO 2004 19-20 June – Leg 2 --> Takes place during EURO 2004 Semi-Final Round 18 August – Game 1--> Friendly Date 4-5 September – Game 2 --> FIFA Date 8 September – Game 3 --> NOT FIFA 9-10 October – Game 4 --> FIFA DATE 13 October – Game 5 -- > FIFA DATE 17 November – Game 6 --> Friendly Date 2005 Final Round 9 February – Game 1 --> Friendly Date 26-27 March – Game 2 --> FIFA Date 30 March – Game 3 --> FIFA Date 4-5 June – Game 4 --> FIFA Date 8 June – Game 5 --> FIFA Date 17 August – Game 6 --> Friendly Date 3-4 September – Game 7 --> FIFA Date 7 September – Game 8 --> FIFA Date 8-9 October – Game 9 --> FIFA Date 12 October – Game 10 --> FIFA Date Fourth-Place Playoff 12 November – Leg 1 --> FIFA Date 16 November – Leg 2 --> FIFA Date As much as I hate to do this, I have to give some credit to the morons who run CONCACRAP. There's only 1 non-FIFA date on the schedule, and that's immediately following an official FIFA date. There are only two "friendly date" qualifiers in both the semi-final round and the final round. Every available official FIFA date is used. Sachin
A little bit of sanity Contrary to Balzer's comments, I don't think that it was the CONCACAF nations' complaints that forced the reorganization of our WCQ's, it was FIFA rejecting Warner's proposal and sending it back, saying to be a bit more reasonable about fixture congestion and give some rope to the higher seeded nations. I expect FIFA said "read my lips" and suggested the new format themselves. I think that the solution was a good last-minute compromise, especially with the congestion caused by Olympic qualifying in this month and in Mexico City in January, and in combo with the U20 World . In my opinion, having the first round (after the minnow run-off in the preliminary round) is an improvement, and less likely to produce an aberration than the old format. It's always better to be master of your own destiny, and not have to rely on a better goals-against formula if you tie the best competitor on points in a three nation series. And the whole idea of a six-matchdate series lasting from January to June was ridiculous. I don't expect the format will be changed again by FIFA in early December, as they probaly instigated the latest version. WE NOW HAVE A CLEAR ROADMAP !
Re: It's a joke.... Amen! I'm surprised it took that long before the "18 MATCHES?!?!?!??? That's crap!" type of response came out. I think it's ridiculous to have any nation have to play that many to qualify. I do like having the home-home series to weed out 1/2 of the smaller nations. But there shouldn't be another 18 matches after that. I don't care how big the confederation is.
How the Nations break down CONCACAF World Cup 2006 Qualifying (Numbers after nations refer to current FIFA ranking) 20 first round nations (Preliminary round, 10 groups of 2, home-and-away) Anguilla 197 Aruba 195 Bahamas 191 Bermuda 183 British Virgin Islands 173 Cayman Islands 177 Cuba 57 Dominica 184 Dominican Republic 167 Grenada 148 Guyana 179 Haiti 85 Montserrat 204 Netherlands Antilles 186 Puerto Rico 200 Saint Lucia 123 St. Kitts and Nevis 126 Suriname 154 Turks and Caicos Islands 203 US Virgin Islands 199 2 unseeded nations with a bye to the second round (Will join the 10 winners of preliminary round) Belize 172 Nicaragua 169 12 seeded nations with a bye to the second round Barbados 107 Canada 83 Costa Rica 19 El Salvador 93 Guatemala 74 Honduras 44 Jamaica 46 Mexico 8 Panama 122 St. Vincent and The Grenadines 159 Trinidad and Tobago 59 USA 12 ______________________________ Okay, so I've looked but can't find any mention anywhere of how the preliminary round will be drawn. Given that the byes were obviously not dictated by FIFA ranking but rather by results in the last qualifying campaign, I'd be interested to see how those first 10 pairings match up. Also interesting is the fact that Cuba and Haiti are ranked so high in relation to the others in the preliminary round....