USMNT: The March to Brazil - World Cup 2014

[Yachtzee]

Did Platini have anything to do with France getting that nice Group?

That team and it's misfit toys and bad apples gets a reprieve and is rewarded with that group?

At least Uruguay got a tough group after stumbling in the WCQ...because their coach refuses to bring in younger faster more offensive players in the MF and not realizing that this is not 2007-10 and Lugano needs to go.

Pretty lucky what they got...same with Argentina. Some good teams will be gone in the group phase.

The joke I hear is that Bladder wants to add more African and Asian teams and reduce the SA and European ones. Now in Europe i can understand with all the small countries they have ..I mean come on...Luxembourg? San Marino?

The SA teams could go play all of Asia, Oceania and win out just about every time......and besides Mexico and the US, depending on form...... the same thing with CONCACAF.

Oceana should be brought into Asia and they should get 4 at most teams in.

To answer your question on Plantini and France, the answer may well be "yes."

http://www.bigsoccer.com/soccer/bill...o-on-the-cart/

Personally I find the whole ranking and pot system for the World Cup to be broken. First the rankings. How in the world is Switzerland ranked high enough to be a seeded team? I've seen them play and they aren't that great. They got extremely lucky in the draw for UEFA qualifying, being put in a group with Norway, Slovenia, Iceland, Albania, and Cyprus. They got to the World Cup without playing anyone of consequence and got rewarded with an absurdly high FIFA ranking and a seed in the World Cup. They aren't even the 8th best team in Europe let alone the World.

Next the pots. Doing the pots by rankings for one pot and Confederations for the others is ridiculous. The rankings may be have some silliness like Switzerland being 8th, but putting teams together in the same pot based on Confederation means you're treating all teams in the same Confederation as equal regardless of their performance in qualifying. So the US gets no credit for their dominant qualifying campaign and Mexico gets no penalty even though they almost failed to qualify.

I think they need to fix the ranking system first and then do pots based on rankings rather than Confederation.

I think Blatter's talk of adding African and Asian teams at the expense of European and South American teams is really aimed at throwing bones to the third world countries that are his power base and sticking it to Europe and South America, from which he will most likely get his most serious challenge in the next FIFA election. UEFA may have a lot of weaker sisters in their Confederation, but they also have a lot of strong teams. What they need to do is revamp their qualifying process to weed out the weaker teams early in qualifying, as CONCACAF does with the Caribbean nations.

The next three World Cups should be interesting in that each one has the potential of being a disaster of epic proportions. Brazil may not have been a bad idea when they chose it, but changes in the economy have caused a lot of problems and there are already massive protests about the World Cup. If the Brazilians don't do well on home soil, it could become a powder keg of unrest. I wonder if the government is reconsidering whether it was a good idea to host both the World Cup and the Olympics in the same cycle. Each is in and of itself an expensive undertaking even in the best of economies. I can't imagine how much hosting both is putting a stain on the finances of Brazil and Rio de Janeiro. The next up is Russia, which seems to have returned to the days of repressing it's people and bullying it's neighbors. Then you have Qatar, with it's ridiculous heat and allegations of using what amounts to slave labor to build its World Cup facilities. Somehow I think when they pick the host of 2026, we'll see a very safe choice just because Blatter may well be gone and the FIFA powers might be looking for a host with as few headaches as possible.

[Caveat Emperor]

Given the regional instability and set of issues required to play in Qatar (including the requirement that the tournament move to winter), I'm still fairly confident that the WC never ends up being played there.

[bucksfan2]

FIFA is corrupt, maybe one of the most corrupt organizations around today. Does anyone think that is going to change anytime soon?

As for the US draw, when other countries aren't happy to see the Americans in a draw that is good, right? Sure they got a tough draw, but they other than Germany who I think might have the most talented group of players in the WC, is the draw that awful? Portugal is good, but they have always struggled internationally even with soccer's best player. Ghana has knocked the US out of WC in the recent past, but its a team the us should beat, no?

It isn't a great draw, but getting Germany in the 3rd game may be beneficial because they could have the division wrapped up. It was noted that they will have to travel the furthest out of any WC team, but is that an issue for the Americans who are used to flying over the Atlantic to play in WC matches? It may be tough, but the Americans can get 4 points out of this group, probably enough to push them through.

[MWM]

As for the US draw, when other countries aren't happy to see the Americans in a draw that is good, right? Sure they got a tough draw, but they other than Germany who I think might have the most talented group of players in the WC, is the draw that awful? Portugal is good, but they have always struggled internationally even with soccer's best player. Ghana has knocked the US out of WC in the recent past, but its a team the us should beat, no?

One correction. He is not the world's best player. That title belongs to Lionel Messi.

[Yachtzee]

One correction. He is not the world's best player. That title belongs to Lionel Messi.

He is a pretty good actor though. Drives me nuts when he simulates a foul, gets the call, then has that cheesy grin afterwards.

[RedTeamGo!]

Ghana has knocked the US out of WC in the recent past, but its a team the us should beat, no?

Ghana has a world class midfield

[BuckeyeRed27]

Ghana has a world class midfield

Everyone's definition of world class varies, but I would say Ghana has a good midfield that is only marginally better than the US midfield, but the US has the best player (Bradley).

I say this making the assumption that the better Boateng doesn't play for Ghana, I always get them mixed up.

[Dwarftree]

I say this making the assumption that the better Boateng doesn't play for Ghana, I always get them mixed up.

Jerome Boateng, Bayern Munich / Germany




Kevin-Prince Boateng, Schalke 04 / Ghana


Just to help you out


@Yachtzee

I agree that the seeding and following that up the pots in which the teams were placed might seem to be a bit strange. But how else would you rank teams except for the results they produced over a certain time span? Based on name or past merits? Wrong way. Because then you always would have the same names in pot 1. Brasil, The Netherlands, Argentina, Italy, England, Germany, France, Uruguay etcpp You name it.

No. I think the current ranking system is fine and a country like Switzerland has deserved it to have been put into pot 1. And a team like France that, even tough a so called big name, completely imploded over the last tourneys so they "well deserved" to get put into pot 3. I just don´t know how else you could alter the system to make it more fair. I really have no idea.

[Tony Cloninger]

The working standard when talking about a city's population is the Metropolitan Statistical Area (city plus suburbs). There are 32 of those in the U.S. with 2+ million, 16 with a population larger than Uruguay.

Though it should be noted that Uruguay is almost singularly focused on soccer. It doesn't turn out major athletes in any other sport. Being nestled between two of the sport's superpowers (Argentina and Brazil) also helps. That's a big reason why Uruguay manages to be freakishly good at this sport.

Before 2010 Uruguay was barely considered a Top 20 team. They were a relic of the past who had their occasional good showings and players like Enzo Francescoli, Alvaro Recoba and Marcelo Silva. Their NT coach rebuilt that infrastructure from Under 15 on up since 2007.... so now you have the 2010 showing, the 2011 Copa America Cup for the record 15th time... Finalist in the 2011 and 2013 U-17 and U-20 WC. Quarters in the 2013 U-17 WC.

That 2006 Playoff debacle vs Australia...where Uruguay thought all they needed to do was show up...and then Forlan is hurt 20 minutes in the 2nd leg and 2 other MF are out of it from the start. They lose out on penalties and the country just said enough..... and changed things and it has been full speed ahead since then.


So any country who's main resource in sports is geared towards this sport...should be able to accomplish or come close to accomplishing what they are doing. I also think besides Suarez, Cavani and maybe a couple of others...that team is basically a collection of average players who are used in correct formations against the opponent and the ability to work for the team.... but when you look at them at their clubs.... some hardly feature at all. Together though they seem to find a way to get it done...but I think you can only stretch that so far. If their MF had Francescoli and Recoba...I would favor them myself and that is always hard to do even as an Uruguayan.

[SunDeck]

Maybe the US will be a top tier team when this kind of stuff happens:

Germans to Build Their Base on Coast for World Cup
http://abcnews.go.com/Sports/wireSto...d-cup-21205372

The base is still under construction and will consist of 14 two-story houses for players and team officials. A media center and practice field will be nearby.

[Yachtzee]

Jerome Boateng, Bayern Munich / Germany




Kevin-Prince Boateng, Schalke 04 / Ghana


Just to help you out


@Yachtzee

I agree that the seeding and following that up the pots in which the teams were placed might seem to be a bit strange. But how else would you rank teams except for the results they produced over a certain time span? Based on name or past merits? Wrong way. Because then you always would have the same names in pot 1. Brasil, The Netherlands, Argentina, Italy, England, Germany, France, Uruguay etcpp You name it.

No. I think the current ranking system is fine and a country like Switzerland has deserved it to have been put into pot 1. And a team like France that, even tough a so called big name, completely imploded over the last tourneys so they "well deserved" to get put into pot 3. I just don´t know how else you could alter the system to make it more fair. I really have no idea.

I think any ranking system where a team can go from 30 to 8 over a span where they're playing Norway, Slovenia, Iceland, Albania, and Cyprus could be improved. That doesn't mean I think France should be higher. I just don't think Switzerland is as good as they are ranked. As another example, in 2006 the US was ranked 4th in FIFA ranking leading up to the World Cup in Germany. They finished last in their group in the 2006 World Cup and I don't think anyone in their right mind thought the US was the 4th best team in the World going into the World Cup. Does anyone really believe Switzerland is better than the Netherlands or better yet Brazil, whose ranking dropped because they didn't have to participate in qualifying? I don't think it needs to be thrown out, but it does need to be tweaked. Maybe use ELO rankings instead. I also think UEFA would do better to break qualifying into a preliminary group stage and a qualifying group stage to weed out some teams and ensure that the teams that qualify have actually played the better opponents.

As far as pots for the World Cup go, I think it should be a straight ranking system all the way through. Even if you use the flawed FIFA rankings, things will tend to even out in the wash. The goal should be to have the groups as evenly balanced as possible rather than having multiple "groups of death" and "groups of dearth."

[Dwarftree]

Not a bad idea.Even though i had to look up what ELO means. But yeah, you are right with this. I kinda had the same idea based on the system with which the UEFA crowns the European top scorer every year. Every point a player scores gets multiplied by a factor (which is determined by the UEFA coefficent with which the league he plays in is judged) depending on the league he plays in. Basically meaning that even if someone in England or Spain scores less than someone let´s say in Austria the player from England/Spain will have more points because he faced tougher opponents.

I think that is what you were talking about. And i agree. A system like that definitely would be fairer.

[improbus]

My thoughts on the World Cup Draw
1) There is no correct system. The World Cup Draw suffers from the same problems that college football does. There is too much variance and not enough of a sample size to get a proper rating. National teams are too hard to measure. How can you even try to compare a CONCACAF team to a UEFA team? Based on friendlies/past World Cup cycles? It would be WAY too hard.

2) I don't trust FIFA, but they are given a completely impossible task. Imagine trying to manage soccer. Just thinking about it makes my brain hurt.

3) You need to win the games in front of you. There is no easy road to winning the World Cup.

4) In the end, FIFA wants an entertaining tournament, which they will get.

[texasdave]

Soccer related article here. Two SI writers pick their all-time US soccer sides.

http://soccer.si.com/2013/12/19/our-...-xi/?eref=sihp

[5TimeWSChamps]

Really not excited about Michael Bradley going to Toronto.

Your 3 best players in a World Cup Year are playing against inferior competition.

While your best goal scorer and starting striker is playing against superior competition when it would have been better for him to stay at AZ and put in 30+ goals again.