Will 48 teams ruin the FIFA World Cup?

I did not ignore Nemesis's comment. I pointed out that if you take a fairly well-understood and respected ranking system the point still stands. If you bothered to read my comment carefully you could easily find out for yourself that Wales (European championship semi-finalists) are ranked 28.

Aubgraham, totally ignoring Nemesis's comment, you made a comment that does not make much sense. No-one in football takes these rankings seriously. Wales a ranked 12th in the world for crying out loud, if Wales is the 12th best team in the world I'd eat my hat.

aubgraham Correct, whichever way you slice and dice it, very good European and South American nations are getting dudded in favour of plenty of weaker nations. Until I did this little exercise, it hadn't occurred to me that China is the lowest ranked country to fill out the new spaces which have been made available (ignoring Oceania) - it all starts to make sense when viewed from that perspective.

Yes, indeed. 1 Member, 1 vote. If you want a different system, gather your friends and draw up a Constitution for a new global football organisation & go for it.

Based on the well-understood Elo ranking system (see http://eloratings.net/world.html) this is the current top 48 26 UEFA 9 CONMEBOL 5 AFC 4 CONCACAF 4 CAF I think the point still stands that IF representation was based on quality Europe and South America are getting dudded.

If you take the time to read & learn about the FIFA ranking system you will understand why the World Cup finals tournament is not, never has been and never will be, the highest 48 ranked nations. However, the arithmetic involved in the ranking calculations might be beyond the comprehension of many.

I just thought I'd go through the current FIFA rankings, and see how the spots would be filled based on current rankings. What you immediately see is that Europe and South America are getting completely dudded, and the smaller confederations are getting far more spots than what their rankings deserve. For example, European nations make up 27 of the top 48 countries, but will only have 16 spots. South America has 8 countries in the top 48. You will have good teams such as Peru, Ecuador and Paraguay fighting it out for that final 6th spot. COMCACAF has three countries in the top 48, the ones that currently make the WC regularly, but then it drops off pretty rapidly, so you will have countries making it like: Panama (ranked 58), Haiti (ranked 73) and Honduras (ranked 75), plus another half spot. Africa has six countries in the top 48, and then three good teams just out of the top 48, so their 9 spots look reasonably justified. Asia has 4 countries in the top 48, then there's Saudi Arabie (54), Uzbekistan (62), UAE (64) and China (82), plus another half spot. So no guesses for who the big winner is here. No Oceania countries in the top 100. Incredibly, outside of the top 16 European ranked countries, you are going to have countries battling out for final spots like Hungary, Bosnia, Ukraine, Austria, North Ireland, Romania, Sweden, Greece, Czech Republic, Serbia, Denmark and even Russia.

Cricket?

Well if they give 2 spots to the OFC it will be a common occurence, but what is the concern? If they give 1 spot it will be a lot rarer than in the Confederations cup because world cup qualification is home and away. I was concerned however to see a semi final being reduced to a Pakistan cricket team batting collapse. Its quite obvious that Brazil lost deliberately, their major victory in the world cup was arresting their greatest rival in scalping tickets.

I've watched the National Team since the late 1970s. The quality of football has improved astronomically since then. Some squads will be stronger, some will be weaker. But the football being played is improving every year. If Ange Postecoglou had been in charge of the team at WC2006, I daresay we'd have gone even further than we did. Hiddink was good but, like all Europeans, he didn't Truly Believe Aussie players can do anything - as Ange believes.

I think the argument about exposing nations to the World Cup to improve their quality is vastly overrated. This is not the 1930s, when there was no TV and players leaving their country to play football in another country was unheard of. These days, people can watch football from just about anywhere in the world and players from almost anywhere can go and play in leagues in other countries, including the top leagues if they're good enough. Look at our Socceroos as an example. Has playing in the last three World Cups improved the quality of the Socceroos or football generally in Australia? One could mount quite reasonable arguments that the quality of our national team has gone backwards since 2006, rather than forwards, and that improvements in the fortunes of professional football within Australia have more to do with finally having competent people in charge of the leagues and its clubs rather than qualifying for successive World Cups.

"I was just listening to Simon HIll on one of the soccer podcasts. He was quite scathing about the decision. His view is that Africa and Asia have so many votes between them that they can push through almost any format change." Yes. The popular vote is unacceptable in any electoral process. There should be the opportunity to gerrymander. At the very least a vote from a person with white skin should be valued 10x that of people who are not white skin; a person with blue eyes 10x that of person without blue eyes; blonde hair vote 10x that of not blonde hair. That should keep the Africans & Asians in check.

"I do disagree with is lowering the threshold of “merit” " So, you'd prefer to go back to 13 teams in the World Cup Finals as we had in 1930? Or do you have some other magical number that is the "threshold of merit"?

Sometimes you have to be exposed to something before you can improve in it, and challenge those who are at a higher standard. This relates to anything in life. Don't worry about the elite. They want all the money to flow in their direction with as few as possible able to get anything from the pie. You know: the rich get richer, and the poor get poorer. This could relate to anything in life really. How can you say someone is not good enough if you don't give them exposure at a certain level, and time to get better at it?

I don't have anything against China and the Middle East, particularly if they qualify for the World Cup on "merit". What I do disagree with is lowering the threshold of "merit" required to qualify for a World Cup specifically for the purpose of ensuring that they qualify. You say China would qualify under the 32 team format in 10 years' time anyway. I'm not sure about that. Despite all the investment China has made in football over the last 10 years, their national team has gone backwards. Why is everyone so certain that all the spending over the next 10 years will do any better?

Will more teams advance through the Continental qualifiers? Yes. So hence "games will shift away from the continental qualifying structure earlier". Yes the same qualifying process will still be in place (unfortunately), but less teams will drop out before having the opportunity to play countries they normally otherwise wouldn't. Why not simply remove the continental divide for qualification. On the one hand it may lower the chances of developing federations from making the "finals", but on the other hand it provides these same countries with facing the more developed federations during the qualifying stages and removes the tedious repetition that the current format faces. Take China as an example, rather than playing Aust, Sth Korea, UAE etc every 4 years for the opportunity to enter the WC finals and face the bigger nations (which will help promote the code), simply allow them the opportunity to play the likes of Brazil/Argentina/Germany etc in the qualifying process. That will give the game in China/India more exposure and help develop the code quicker.

It has been expanding Squash has gone backwards since the 80s, so has jazzercise

So China is equal to tonga in your judgement of equity?

In 10 years time China will likely be able to qualify on merit in a 32 team tournament any way. Simon Hill is an Englishman with traditional views about the game. Clearly he is of the view that African and Asian nations should be seen and not heard. It seems like he thinks they should just be quiet and be grateful for even being invited to the World Cup. Africa and Asia represent nearly 6 billion people on the planet. What have you got against China and the Middle East exactly? If China is in the best 48 and plays in the World Cup, how does that diminish the World Cup in any way? Surely it improves the spectacle.

I was just listening to Simon HIll on one of the soccer podcasts. He was quite scathing about the decision. His view is that Africa and Asia have so many votes between them that they can push through almost any format change. I agree with him on one point, part of this change is to allow an easier path for China and Middle Eastern countries. Asia will be allowed 8.5 countries. Guess who are the 8th and 9th ranked nations in Asia? They also made a reference to India, but their view was that the number of countries would have to increase to 128 before India had a chance of qualifying for the world cup.