I'd love to get a rematch against Iran at some point.
I'd love to get a rematch against Iran at some point.
The last two World Cups have been the absolute pits. International football ended with "that" headbutt.
Why Uruguay?
We had a very bitter home and away qualifying series in 2005.Originally Posted by Disco
Ended with this after our players were spat on and threatened by their fans at every given chance in the lead up to the first leg in Uruguay.
https://youtu.be/K4fOtbKUme0
Iran are definitely on the list but an Asian Cup final would be perfect.
That would be pretty special.
Incidentally, I give it ten years before the West Asian nations force the Asian Cup to go the same way as the Asian Champion's League, and keep the east and west nations apart until the final.
Still, we won so they can suck it.
This will be tacky but there can't be many things more pathetic than watching so called grown men from those Arab nations attempting to play a contact sport.
Why Iran?
Chip on our shoulders still from the 1997 world cup qualification decider. Their diving and time wasting put them on the list of forever enemies in football.
Football in the Arab world (stretching from Morocco all the way to Iran) is little more than the attempt to go 1-0 up and then run the clock down. They don't see that as timewasting. They see it as the normal game. Why would you carry on playing when you only need to run the clock down.
It's fucking glorious when it backfires and they suddenly all pour forward in the 88th minute, before giving up and getting sent off in petulant rage.
It's also why the region has never produced a world class footballer.
Have 64 teams.
Do a knockout round to start based on the FIFA rankings of each team. So if you're ranked the lowest out of the 64 teams you would play the #1 team in the world.
Play this round. Reseed the teams based on the remaining. Have another knockout round (highest vs. lowest, 2nd highest vs. 2nd lowest... etc.)
Remaining 16 teams would then go into 4 groups based on the same rankings. Highest ranked in Group A, 2nd in Group B, 3rd in Group C, 4th in Group D. Lowest ranked then in Group A, 2nd lowest ranked into B. Etc. etc.
Round robin. Everyone plays everyone once. Top 4 teams advance to the Semi-Finals.
Highest point total gets #1 seed, so on and so forth. Tiebreakers determined by GD.
If Omar Abdulrahman ever actually left the UAE, he'd be in that category. It's despairingly crazy that he won't.
Youssef Msakni (Tunisia) should have been enjoying a top level European career for the last 5 years but is instead pissing away his best years at Lekhwiya in Qatar for easy money. It's just how they're wired.
Aboutrika
Mustapha Hadji was world class in my heart.
The Far East has also never produced a world class player, although in their case it's because The Company comes first.
And America hasn't because of their pathetic college system.
Nakata carried a world class reputation. He was in Nike ads and everything.
Only to get to the crapanese market. Sorry, Japanese. I got a sternly worded letter from Ital last time I used that. Seol Ki-Hyeon also in the cage advert.
Nakamura kicked a free-kick through an open bus window. ON PURPOSE.
Yah, my country's hopes rely on Christian Pulisic at the moment.
So...
I was against the expansion, but since it's now happening I feel slightly aggrieved that countries like Curacao, Haiti, China and UAE are looking like standard options for the World cup and New Zealand got a pretty much guaranteed spot whilst we are never going to make it to a World cup
That's where it's a load of bollocks.I was against the expansion, but since it's now happening I feel slightly aggrieved that countries like Curacao, Haiti, China and UAE are looking like standard options for the World cup and New Zealand got a pretty much guaranteed spot whilst we are never going to make it to a World cup
'World' being the key word. There should be a large geographical element if you want to grow the game, or else you're saying that certain countries/regions will always be inferior.
I want to see the best teams in the world at the time. Not the best from regions thrown together. That might be legitimate 'world' but it's not a legitimate tournament.
I am not saying the places should've been given out proportionally in the same manner as the first 32. That said, obviously as a fan of a minnow nation that has very little chance usurping the big boys in our confederation I envy the chances some teams that I don't think are much better will have a probable chance of qualifying.
We'll make a tournament during my lifetime as half of Europe now qualifies for Euros and the World cup will probably grow to 64 countries by 2030.
Finland are terrible, Pen. You probably wouldn't qualify for the AFCON.
Finland 1998-2001ish would have a chance of making the 48 team cup, i.e. not terrible. And you really should have made a Euros by now.
And they're still better than the likes of Haiti.
I am under no illusions regarding our national team. I've seen those jokers live on four different decades now and I'm still waiting to leave the stadium after a Finland win. We might not be completely shit for eternity though and that's when competing against teams of the quality of those listed above would increase our chances of qualifying for a World cup tenfold. I'm somewhere between you and Giggles on this one. I bet the people making these decisions saw the value of those Asian spots especially, but I would have preferred to see Europe and Africa get maybe two/three more each with Asia, Oceania (they really don't ned a guaranteed place for New Zealand) and Central and North America getting less.
How many Finland and Haiti games have you seen?
I reckon I could name maybe four current Finnish internationals, and the only one who's a legitimately top player has just been banned for ninety years for sniffing.
John, go fuck off and waste your time in someone else. You wouldn't have a fucking clue about either yourself.
I've said as much in the second line of my post. I'm not the one claiming with certainty that one is better than the other.
So this is how it's going to look with 48 teams:
Europe: 16 (13)
Africa: 9 (5)
Asia: 8,5 (4,5)
Concacaf: 6,5 (3,5)
South America: 6 (4,5)
Oceania 1 (0.5)
And one place for the hosts.
Concacaf getting the same amount of new places as Europe and Asia getting more is a bit lol.
I've seen enough of them to know that Finland are better. And you know full well they are too.
Haiti and Curaçăo wouldn't actually qualify, they just game the rankings by only playing other Caribbean teams (I think). Nobody in real qualification goes to those Central American countries and gets anything.
Oceania and Asia should merge just for the lolz.
I don't. All I know full well is that you haven't watched a second of either, and won't have done since whenever Finland last played Ireland.
It's an odd thing to be strident about something you know nothing about.
Whether we are shit or not (and we are) is kind of irrelevant. It's just that when we possibly do an Iceland or get a golden generation or whatever, I'd much rather try to dislodge the likes of Panama, Curacao and Haiti whilst keeping Jamaica, Guatemala and St. Kitts & Newis behind us than trying to get in front of Turkey, Hungary, Slovakia, Ukraine and Bosnia whilst trying to keep Sweden, Austria, Romania and Northern Ireland behind us. Just to put it in a context. We might never do it with the second lot, but I'm confident we would do it at some point with the first.
We can of course argue the relevance of Finland getting to a World cup or what would they add, but I don't think its different compared to any other minnow who might make it to a World cup with the added places.
It's just a ploy to get more FIFA Congress votes by expanding the number of additional countries to ones which are more easily corruptible. Why see it as anything else?
It's about joining hands around the globe and promoting the people's game. For the people. Of the globe.
Whilst rifling through their pockets and fleecing them for tax-free cash
Finally some good news, Saudi Arabia have pulled out of hosting the 2030 World Cup.
Have probably learned from Qatar that it really isn't worth the hassle.
If the South American bid loses to the fuck-up Spain+ bid I might cry.
Aye because they're buying all the players to make their own one.
Posting Permissions
Reply With Quote