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How Can The World Cup Be Improved?
Comments(10)Fearless Leader Bob over at the main site posed this question today, with some suggestions. I’ve got some thoughts of my own.
Bob’s proposals are italicised (you can check out his reasoning over here). My responses follow.
Don’t decide games on penalty kicks: I do beg to differ. Brasil-Netherlands in 1998 – 4-2 on penalties after a lukewarm 1-1 affair. The penalty shootout was nail-biting, Taffarel-worshipping high drama. Loved it.
Play a two-game final: Eh? 90 minutes is sufficient – enough time to cry, laugh, scream, jump up and down maniacally, swear at the television, hug your neighbour in the pub. 180 minutes would be torture. Oh, and the players would be tired, too.
More qualifying play-in matches between federations: Now this I find interesting. Bahrain vs Trinidad round two, anyone? Mexico vs Argentina? Ooh.
Don’t give an automatic qualifying spot to the host country: Controversial. Although this just might fly – this year for the first time the defending champions don’t have an automatic place – I agree with Euler in that you’re depriving the fans of the host country of a chance to root for the home team.
Make the seeding process more relevant: Yes, and while you’re at it, sort out those insane FIFA rankings.
Over on the Iran blog, my fellow blogger Afshin Afshar thinks the World Cup needs to return to its 16 team format. Says he: “Who cares about all these boring games between countries which don’t even have a legitimate professional league?”
I totally disagree. On the grounds of ‘boring,’ the snooze-fest that was much of Euro 2004 should have been cancelled halfway through. Leaving aside for a moment what constitutes a “legitimate” PFL, let’s look at the US: it was primarily due to their performance in Italy in 1990 that football gained currency in the mainstream. (The bastards. As a Trinidadian, the success of the US in Italy is due ENTIRELY to the failure of T&T. Ergo, I am bitter. End tangent.) Now, their Major League is attracting the likes of David Beckham.
The movement toward a 32-team World Cup was a godsend for CONCACAF, the AFC (Asia) and the CAF (Africa) especially.
I’m not sure how feasible it would be to increase the number of places still further (I’ll reassess that statement when I ascend to my presidency of FIFA), but I know I would like to see who would have the courage to rearrange the existing allocation of places. Right now, UEFA has 13 of the 32 berths – whereas CAF has 5. Decisions like that aren’t just about football – ultimately, despite FIFA protestations to the contrary, they are about politics.
[...] More interesting ways to improve the World Cup. I wish I had thought of these ideas (Trinidad and Tobago Blog) [...]
Posted from 
United States
I think Europe have that many teams because it has more countries. How many countries are in the Americas, south and north?
About penalty, I could give a finger to banish penalty kicks from the face of the earth. Ok, it’s nail biting, but very unfair and luck has a big part on it. You could flip a coin instead. I like the golden goal idea. Let them play until they start to drop dead. If they are not competent to score a goal they shouldn’t be football players at all. Let them play to death until only one can stand and drag the ball to the net!!!
As I said in the comments on Bob’s post, CAF has 54 nations to Europe’s 52.
I’ll hold fast to the penalties – as someone pointed out chez Bob, the players might just die. I’d rather see Ronaldhino stick around a bit longer 
Posted from 
United Kingdom
[...] Stacy-Marie Ishmael of the Trinidad & Tobago World Cup Blog posts her answers to the question of how the World Cup can be improved. She also reports on the comic book being produced in tribute to the Soca Warriors, Trinidad & Tobago’s national football team. [...]
Posted from United States
[...] Following Bob’s question about how could the perfect competition become even better, and following Stacy Marie from Trinidad and Tobago’s blog, I’ll give my suggestions to improve the World Cup. [...]
Posted from United States
How about scrapping the regional qualifiers and opening it up to world qualifying groups? Not only would this void the arguement of the number of berths each federation has, but also ensure that the world cup tended to include the best teams rather than a large number of also rans. Unfortunately, for alot of those people comlaining that various federations (especially Africa) don’t have enough representaion it would mean teams like Togo, Costa Rica, Saudi Arabia, Trinidad and Tobago, etc would NEVER qualify because they would get mauled by even the lesser European sides.
The reason Europe has so many sides has nothing to do with politics but everything to do with quailty.
The last farce of a world cup aside, non-european/south american sides (with perhaps the exceptions of Mexico and recently the US) have been shockingly bad.
Rather than criticising Europe for ahving so many teams, instead it is perhaps better to wonder how Asia and CONCAF have so many, and how Oceania can be continually denied one?
Posted from United States
I actually don’t think that Costa Rica would get ‘mauled’ by ‘lesser European sides’. There is a general tendency to assume that Europe = amazing football, and that teams from Africa, Asia and CONCACAF wouldn’t stand a chance. This might have been true in the past, but recent matches have demonstrated that these federations are coming into their own.
Don’t underestimate the political nature of FIFA decision making. The tensions run as high as they do in the UN – that’s not an exaggeration.
The reason that CONCACAF has as many as it does is largely thanks to Jack Warner’s tireless lobbying; and I agree with you that the Oceania situation is farcical.
Posted from United Kingdom
I think that Costa Rica’s drubbing at the hands of a Ukraine missing Shevchenko and Rebrov proves otherwise.
Posted from United States
UEFA vs. CAF
Quality vs. quantity.
No not politics, the teams from UEFA are more because they deserve it.
C’mon we ALREADY have teams in each WC edition that are already ecstatic just to be there,
with a difference in performance from all the rest of the teams so huge you’d think it was a joke by FIFA.
Some WC editions actually showed that the CAF particiapants were one too many….but that’s controversial, & I’ll just bow to FIFA’s rules.
Posted from 
Malta
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Allocation of places has been a farce for so long, but it’s unlikely to change any time soon. Oceania were promised a spot FIFA reneged… why grant them confederation status if they’re not worthy of ONE of the 32 spots. This issue with CAF is even more of a joke than that… some of the most entertaining football I’ve seen at the world cup came c/o a CAF nation, and their record hasn’t been to shabby either.
Posted from
Australia