The Official FIFA World Cup Thread - QATAR 2022

[blues_funk_reggae]

Sheesh, reading some of these comments you'd think the Coli would want to take the WC back just 16 teams.

It was a strong, proper tournament and only 1 African country qualified for the final tournament

That will be better to grow the sport.

You doing too much

 

[Duke Wy Lin]

Yeah Germany fukked them up that day. that was a beating and a half

Thiago Silva was team captain that day. Crazy that he's still captain.

You still need something if no goal is scored after a set amount of time. Can't have these folks playing for hours on end.



You were saying?


Not fold under pressure when these dudes are the defending champs





I disagree here. Vehemently. Even in a 16-team WC there were these types of blowouts. I mean Brazil got hit 7-1 in a SEMI-FINAL in their backyard.

UEFA got 13/32 slots. Need to reallocate if anything. If not just call the WC a Euros with Argentina and Brazil.



Lol, you sure breh....we know how Spain performed at the 2018 WC, death by 1000 passes but don't do anything with it. Suisse are a very experienced and well-drilled team, won't be easy for Portugal.


i don't think Switzerland beating Portugal is a shock tbh. They dumped France in the last Euros.

I seen the likes of Mbappe, Dembele collapse under pressure. As late as last seasons CL. Plus they were kinda lucky in the previous world cup. You're talking as if they dominated.

 

[cobra]

Sheesh, reading some of these comments you'd think the Coli would want to take the WC back just 16 teams.

It was a strong, proper tournament and only 1 African country qualified for the final tournament

That will be better to grow the sport.

take away 3 spots from Europe
give 2 to Africa
and 1 to Asia

this 48 team BS is just to get China/India into the world cup

 

[concise]

Don't be dense. You know what I mean. And there's a reason why the format works. The players/managers are already complaining about too much football. And I tend to agree.
You keep opening it up, the whole thing loses prestige. Also, qualifiers are already a mess. Add in more teams and these blowout games happen more. Korea is a good team. But I can't imagine this Brazil going against Honduras or Trinidad.

The 48 team format proposed continues to have the finalist play the same amount of games as they do now, 7. So instead of 3 group stage games and 4 knockout games to be a champion, it's 2 group stage games and 5 knockout games.

32 teams still get their 3 games in, just like now.
More games overall, and also a higher percentage of knockout games.

Inviting 16 teams to the WC to play 2 games and then go home has a minimal effect on fixture congestion compared to expansion of the continental tournaments (expanded Euros, Afcon, etc), expanded club tournaments (Champions League/Copa Lib/Europa Conference), Nations Leagues (lol), Club World Cup (lol)

 

[Yehuda]

That ain't correct fam, Richarlison, Juninho, Rai and some others are few known players who are indeed leftists (or at least voted for Lula).

But many of the rest are evangelicals who supported Bolsonaro : Ney, Allison, Dani Alves, Paqueta, Thiago Silva, and many other known players (Lucas Moura, Gabriel Jesus, Cafu, Rivaldo, Ronaldinho, ...) voted (or called to vote) for Bolso.

Lucas Moura had a whole meltdown against "communism" but TBF most of these clowns haven't lived in the country in years or are looking for tax cuts... and I saw the same Cafu you mentioned supporting politicians from Lula's party during the last municipal elections; shyt is not that cut and dried, B

 

[Optimus Prime]

 

[phcitywarrior]

Then what was the point of them being there? Look at Qatar. They were just fodder for the other 3 teams. That berth was superfluous. Now, I'm all for the host nation getting the auto-berth. In some cases, that might be the ONLY way a team ever gets to the WC. But no, I'm not for extra matches for the sake of extra matches. We lucked up this time around with nations like KSI, Morocco, Senegal, etc. Most of the time, there's a scrub at the bottom of the group. Now you want to potentially add in even more?


Also, I don't know if you watched CAF, but Nigera and Algeria didn't look particularly good. For sure not at the level of the WC. Same for Sweden and Norway. I don't care if these countries have "stars". You have to have TEAMS to make it in.
Now do I think we could rethink allocation? Yes.
But adding more teams does nothing but dilute the schedule with meaningless matches. And I'm from America. We play A LOT of meaningless matches.

Adding 48 teams simply adds one more KO stage if the current plan FIFA is proposing goes through.

12 groups of 4, top 2 qualify and then the best 8 3rd place teams of 12. KOs will start in the round of 32.

For the bolded. Ehhh...how can you tell until you get there? WCQ does not necessarily indicate how one will perform at the WC, just look at Germany. They looked great during WCQ but couldn't make it out of the group. Football isn't so 1 to 1. Italy won the Euros but didn't qualify for the WC.

FIFA will market the move as positive for the non-traditional nations, but it's really to squeeze blood from stones of their federations. This isn't a new plan, this has been a card Havelange kept in his pocket to play. More "involvement", more money. The current system is weighted to let Euro countries make it to the knockout stages anyway. I doubt any expanded system will be different. All it ends up doing is making it possible for countries that love shoring up self-esteem by beating up on the Faroe Islands twice a year, by allowing them to potentially face India in a tournament and do the same.

The reallocation you're envisioning is very, very unlikely.

Of course, it's unlikely hence my saying they should expand the tournament. How's the game gonna develop if you have such a small quota of nations allowed from other regions?

take away 3 spots from Europe
give 2 to Africa
and 1 to Asia

this 48 team BS is just to get China/India into the world cup

I like this idea as well but you know UEFA isn't going for it. I think CAF needs at least 8-9 slots. CONCACAF I think is fine and CONMEBOL could deff use 1-2 more spots.

 

[Malik1time]

Pele
He really gonna pass soon

 

[Liu Kang]

Lucas Moura had a whole meltdown against "communism" but TBF most of these clowns haven't lived in the country in years or are looking for tax cuts... and I saw the same Cafu you mentioned supporting politicians from Lula's party during the last municipal elections; shyt is not that cut and dried, B

I'm not saying they are all Bolsonaristas but many of them are even if it's just for financial gains.

 

[Black Magisterialness]

Adding 48 teams simply adds one more KO stage if the current plan FIFA is proposing goes through.

12 groups of 4, top 2 qualify and then the best 8 3rd place teams of 12. KOs will start in the round of 32.

For the bolded. Ehhh...how can you tell until you get there? WCQ does not necessarily indicate how one will perform at the WC, just look at Germany. They looked great during WCQ but couldn't make it out of the group. Football isn't so 1 to 1. Italy won the Euros but didn't qualify for the WC.



Of course, it's unlikely hence my saying they should expand the tournament. How's the game gonna develop if you have such a small quota of nations allowed from other regions?



I like this idea as well but you know UEFA isn't going for it. I think CAF needs at least 8-9 slots. CONCACAF I think is fine and CONMEBOL could deff use 1-2 more spots.

Which means there's an extra 8 days of knockout matches. That's a lot my guy.

But I am happy that we all agree Europe needs to come off one or two of those spots. Africa and probably S. America deserve another spot.

 

[The Wall Is Undefeated!]

A round-up of today's knockout stage matches.

Japan 1(1) - 1(3) Croatia
After a long match of blades, armour and fire it all came down to penalties. In the end, Samurai Blue couldn't take the heat as Vatreni (The Blazers), Kockasti (The Checkered Ones) burned and checked them out of the World Cup.

Brazil 4 - 1 South Korea
Nothing witty this time. Brazil just prison-raped South Korea during the 1st half. During the 2nd half, Brazil tried to make South Korea kiss them... South Korea said no and score a consolation goal

 

[null]

But adding more teams does nothing but dilute the schedule with meaningless matches. And I'm from America. We play A LOT of meaningless matches.

just add a bit of time and it makes more sense.

over time higher visibility and participation will attract more money and most importantly players will be more likely to stay with home federations.

this will increase the quality of lower teams over time.

reversing the brain drain (player/money drain) if you will ...

 

[phcitywarrior]

Which means there's an extra 8 days of knockout matches. That's a lot my guy.

But I am happy that we all agree Europe needs to come off one or two of those spots. Africa and probably S. America deserve another spot.

They can stage it in such a way where all the RD of 32 games take place over 1 or two days but that's for FIFA to solve.

The bigger issue like you said is Europe is over-represented in the WC and if they don't want to reallocate, then they should increase the tourney. I personally think 40 would have been a happy medium still with a R16 to start the KO rds

 

[Liu Kang]

take away 3 spots from Europe
give 2 to Africa
and 1 to Asia

this 48 team BS is just to get China/India into the world cup

Taking 3 spots away from the best confederation ? You do realize that Italy didn't even make in the current format and Portugal barely did ?

The issue is not Europe, it's the other confeds that need to level up. They are slowly but surely bridging the gap but it takes time.

 

[Nero Christ]

They said that about the last 3 days

yea...when Spain & Portugal go thru...folks will be saying they can't wait for the quarters as the real matchups start