2022 FIFA World Cup Discussion Thread

Read the below yesterday about the biennial WC. Does a good job laying out specifics and how it would impact national teams.

National teams would only have 2 (the preferred option) or 3 contacts a year. The 2 international windows would theoretically be leagues taking off the whole month of October for qualification (to either the WC or continental championship) and then the WC/continental championship in the summer (the Euros would go to every 2 years).

Say goodbyes to friendlies where you can bring in B/C rosters to try out new players. Every national team game will matter for qualification or be in a major tournament, so it will be tougher to introduce new players.

And no offseason at all for the top players.

I don’t like the idea of the WC every 2 years. I imagine it will probably happen, because $$

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UEFA and CONMEBOL should just ask FIFA how much they want not to do it. ‘cause it’s money that FIFA and a large majority of federations want.
And, I do think that UEFA and CONMEBOL will sit out (how?) every other biennial “World” Cup.
Another thing they might do is simply have one qualifying tournament and send the qualifiers to two WC’s in a row. But this really bites in to their own Cups’ times.

I like the idea of every other one being a B-level World Cup. Lesser countries get a shot to play for something meaningful and can build some experience and maybe win a trophy against international competition that they’d otherwise never sniff, the better countries don’t have to run players into the ground. Auto-qualify teams out of World Cup Lite, perhaps put them into pots based on performance, give the winner a seed into the real WC.

Guinea-Bisseau. Has its 2nd qualifier vs. Morocco cancelled due to a coup, has its stadium declared unsafe to use and has to go to Morocco to play the make-up, the whole team gets food poisoning the night before, still has to play, gets waxed 5-0. Oh, and they get another game against Morocco in Morocco in 3 days.

Almost CONCACAF-level stuff there.

The World Cup every 2 years will not happen because the other orgs need the money too. No way does UEFA yield to FIFA. It would end the Euros. Players would also demand significantly more money to play nationals. Lots of players are not that patriotic. I think for many of the players the Champions League is the ultimate prize since it is the best overall competition for the best players.

It comes down to a vote, and there are a lot of Asian and African countries who want that sweet sweet money that they will be promised, which is a lot more than the current set-up. For the same reason WC’s are held in places that have to build future useless stadiums.
Then, Europe and South America will boycott (not sure if it would be every WC or every other WC: it’s possible that FIFA will ban them from competing in all of them); hold their own tournaments as they do now, and, like this coming summer, have their champions meet, except this would happen a week after those tournaments; eventually scheduled exactly opposite the WC Final.
And everyone will recognize that country’s team as the real World Champion.

And all this will suck because our WC in 2026 will be diluted, though we’ll actually have a chance at winning it.

The problem with this is that every country federation has 1 vote. So for every England, France, Germany, and Spain who would be against this, there is a St Lucia, Suriname, Belize, and Curacao that will vote for it since they will be getting more money from FIFA.

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I doubt '26 gets diluted. There’s going to be a few metric tons of cash generated, UEFA and CONMEBOL countries won’t want to miss out on that. Post-26? Completely possible, especially depending on where the off-cycle tournament is held. Offered to someone in Europe? They might think about it because of the close exposure. Morocco, Indonesia, or Congo / DR Congo / Nigeria / Angola / whoever else in that region, other equally obscure soccer countries? Hard pass.

Not sure of the timeline on this proposal. But I hope they don’t stick it to small countries currently without the stadiums. Take away Euro and SA, and I guess it’s USA all the way down. We could hold it in different stadiums for three straight WCs, by my calculation (in my head – some of those turfs would have to be grassed). Hell, the SEC could host one year, Big10 the next.

All soccer federations are equal but some are more equal than others.

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Scotland gets a huge win over Israel to move 4 points up for the runner-up spot in Group F. Also puts Denmark in position to clinch a WC spot with a win over Austria on Tuesday.

Few teams drop out of contention to qualify, mostly minnows that needed all-time miracles to advance. And Ireland.

Beautiful goal by Alphonso Davies, highlighting his speed, skill and smarts.

We’ve now got 3 of the 32 spots filled: Qatar (host), Germany and Denmark.

In the “advancing to the next stage” part we’ve got teams like Senegal and Morocco, Portugal and Serbia, and Russia and Croatia. There’s also whichever of Czech Republic and Wales that doesn’t finish 2nd in their group, and Austria. The latter two would get advanced by being the highest-ranked Nations League champions of their division, and barring a collapse by someone above them would get those final 2 spots.

Given that 2026 is going to 48 teams, this might be our last chance to see high-ranking countries missing out, like Italy and Netherlands did in 2018.

FIFA is reportedly considering a proposal that teams can’t play in consecutive World Cups if they move to a WC every 2 years. This is an even dumber idea.

Per Rob Harris, AP

“More than a dozen” European FAs are considering withdrawing from FIFA is the biannual WC goes through.

It’s probably the most sensible way to go about it, because having to qualify every 2 years is going to be really taxing on countries. Logically, that should throw cold water on the entire idea.

What it would mean practically is that you have a “major” World Cup with all the top countries, and then a “minor” World Cup for all the lesser countries. Not a bad idea really, the lesser countries should have some way to play in a large international competition and gain experience and play for a top prize, but that’s not what FIFA is after here.

More in the article and tweet thread following the one above

Oh this is a good one from John Baby