rip orian

how would you suggest the european qualifiers should be modified? more specifically, what would you base the seeding (currently based on the ridiculous fifa ranking) on to prevent something like this?
that said, if you can't score against sweden in two games, you probably didn't really deserve to qualify - the playoffs provide the teams who indeed drew a hard group a fair and realistic second chance imo...



true, that would have been a nice achievement for him...

Personally I'd have 13 groups of only 4 where only the champion qualifies (would make the group stages more exciting, although it would be harsh having only that one shot to qualify). The reduction of competitive games would be compensated by the Nations League (which I think should have a different format), which would add exciting games and would allow us to see more even matchups than your average qualifying game between Germany and Latvia.

that could just as well have resulted in italy ending up in a group with sweden (who were in pot 3 for this draw, meaning there were at least 18 teams seeded ahead of them) and two random teams which means a loss and a draw in those two direct encounters would likely have meant they're out.

i mean, i'm definitely not opposed to changing our current system, but i don't see how this would have prevented italy's exit to be honest - it would make such "shocking" eliminations even more likely in my opinion. would certainly be more entertaining, i'm not quite sure yet if i like it, but anyway - it doesn't really address my point...

But Sweden would need to eliminate Italy over 6 games instead of 2. In any case, I don't think the system should be changed to favour big teams.

The FIFA system is crap, but tbh I don't see how we could come up with a better one. You could make it so that the 8 quarterfinalists from the Euro get automatically a pot 1 seed, but tbh that wouldn't fix anything since you often get at least one weak team in quarterfinals in the same way FIFA rankings allow for countries like Switzerland to be in pot 1.

The european qualifiers are so competitive that upsets like these will happen every two events or so. If you want to make it safer for them then the only way I can think of is dropping the European playoffs and having the second placed teams play intercontinental playoffs like the rest of the world does, but that would probably result in too many european teams qualifying.

no need to change anything, if fifa continues like that we will have a 128 team world cup soon enough

Personally i would make the obscure countries who stand no chance do a play-in stage.
if you can cut down the 50+ teams to like 25 or 30 the options of what you can do really open up.
Then you have the best teams playing against each other more often to see who wins the spots.

This post was edited by cambovenzi on Nov 13 2017 05:37pm

but only two direct matches against each other. i mean it's not like sweden lucked into this by finishing 2nd in a ridiculously easy group, they had france and netherlands in there. so again, i think your system would probably not have changed anything for italy and rather lead to more surprise exits while my question specifically targeted those suggesting it was an inherent flaw in the current mode that lead to italy's failure to qualify...



me neither



true unfortunately.




then plz define "obscure countries who stand no chance". countries like iceland? oh wait...
i mean, how would you determine this, the ridiculous fifa ranking again? and what would you gain in terms of qualifying spots, what is the outcome you're trying to achieve here? also, how often would the teams have to play each other in your version?

pots 5 and 6 are filled with hot garbage. (and most of pot 4)

Iceland was a pot 2 team.




based on ranking in previous tournaments/games. the fifa rankings arent great and some reform there is good too, but i dont think they are so inaccurate that a gibraltar is going to be top 30.

The outcome im looking for is better quality games with top teams actually competing against each other for the world cup spots instead of seeing who can beat San Marino the most soundly.

This post was edited by cambovenzi on Nov 13 2017 08:38pm

i disagree, the fifa rankings are inaccurate enough that romania (who didn't even qualify for the 2014 wc, finished last in their group at the 2016 euro, and now finished 4th in their incredibly weak qualifying group - behind poland, denmark, and montenegro) made it into pot 1, while france for example (who are amongst the title favourites) were in pot 2 - they certainly are the main flaw of the current system, which otherwise makes a lot of sense in terms of fairness.

and i still don't fully understand what the point of "better quality games" would be - you are aware this is just the qualification for the tournament, right? the point is not to make it a spectacle, but to find a somewhat fair way to determine who is worthy of the spots we got for the world cup finals.

also, it would help if you could be a little more specific as to how many groups and how many games your suggestion would mean for each team, and how many qualifying rounds you suggest - because it's pretty difficult to argue the benefits and drawbacks of such a vague suggestion...