2018 World Cup Update: Introduction, Sort Of

Well, there’s been a bunch of early round World Cup qualification action. As of today, of the 207 countries that entered and weren’t disqualified, 23 have already been eliminated. Since only 23 have gotten the axe, I’ll go ahead and list them. Sorry Brunei, Macau, Mongolia, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, the Turks and Caicos Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Anguilla, the Bahamas, the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands, Montserrat, Aruba, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Guyana, St. Lucia, Bermuda, Dominica, Puerto Rico, St. Kitts and Nevis, and Suriname, better luck in 2019!

Astute observers will note a certain trend, though. Many of these places lack any sort of soccer tradition (e.g., Mongolia and Pakistan) or are places more well known for exporting rum than soccer players (e.g., those Caribbean island nations). Of course, other astute observers will not that some of those places aren’t actually countries (e.g., Macau and Puerto Rico), but that’s a discussion that can get complicated pretty quickly, so we’ll avoid it here.

So, let’s finally do a proper kick-off post for the 2018 World Cup.

Amidst all that unpleasantness during the FIFA Congress back in late May, they did get around to announcing the bids for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups. As expected, they remained the same, but the sake of convenience we’ll break it down it again.

  • Hosts: 1 bid
  • AFC: 4.5 bids (for 54 teams)
  • CAF: 5 bids (for 53 teams)
  • CONCACAF: 3.5 bids (for 18 teams)
  • CONMEBOL: 4.5 bids (for 10 teams)
  • OFC: 0.5 bids (for 11 teams)
  • UEFA: 13 bids (for 52 teams)
  • Total: 32

There are still some unknowns, so this post won’t be as comprehensive as I’d like. The preliminary draw for the World Cup will occur on July 25th, so look for an update after that. The main reason qualifying started this early at all is because FIFA modified the international calendar, which eliminated the confederations’ ability to schedule qualification matches in February and August.

Since the action has already started, I’ve been updating the 2018 Status page. I also added June’s FIFA rankings as well, mostly because I wanted to know what the highest ranked team eliminated so far was. The answer is 107th ranked Cuba. The lowest ranked side to advance in any confederation’s competition so far is 160th ranked Grenada.

AFC
The AFC is the Asian Football Confederation. It covers most of continental Asia except for countries that have ties to or are otherwise part of Europe (Russia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Turkey, Armenia, and Cyprus), plus Israel (because… reasons) and Australia (which left the OFC in 2006 in search of stronger competition). By far the most successful Asian country is South Korea, which has qualified for the finals nine times (including every World Cup starting with the 1986 event in Mexico) and is the only Asian country to have made it past the Round of 16, finishing fourth when they co-hosted with Japan in 2002.

The AFC will receive 4.5 bids for the finals in 2018. What does it mean to get half a bid, though? Well, it means that four teams will qualify directly, while a fifth team will have to play-off against a team from another confederation for the last spot. Who that team will play has not been decided yet.

The AFC’s qualification process began back in March, with the 12 lowest ranked teams (according to FIFA’s rankings) were paired up to whittle the number down to 6. India, Yemen, Timor-Leste, Cambodia, Chinese Taipei, and Bhutan advanced. These six then joined the confederation’s 34 other teams to begin the second round, which divided the 40 teams into eight five team groups. This means that (almost) all of the confederation’s teams began participating earlier this month. (Indonesia was suspended by FIFA, so there are only 39 teams actually competing.) No huge surprises so far, but there’s a few amusing observations to be had:

  • Hong Kong and China were drawn into the same group. Both have played Bhutan. Hong Kong won 7-0, but China only managed a 6-0 win.
  • 2022 hosts Qatar were also drawn into that group, and needed a goal in the ninth (ninth?) minute of stoppage time to beat the literally tiny island nation of the Maldives.
  • Speaking of tiny island nations, go go Guam, which isn’t even technically a country! Home to 159,358 people according to the 2010 U.S. Census, they beat Turkmenistan (population: 5,171,943) 1-0, and then beat India (population: 1,210,193,422) 2-1.
  • One more from the “tiny island nations” file: Singapore drew Japan in Japan, 0-0. 
  • 2014 almost-darlings Uzbekistan (they totally should’ve qualified) aren’t starting off so hot this time around, with a 4-2 loss to North Korea.

The top team from each group, plus the top four runners-up will advance, but all five teams in each group play each other home-and-home through next March, so it’ll be awhile before we know. These remaining twelve teams will be split into two groups of six, which will then play home-and-home series through 2017, with the top two teams going to Russia and the third place teams duking it out for a shot at the inter-confederation play-off.

CAF
The Confederation of African Football has, thankfully, changed its format for this World Cup. It’s still not perfect, though. The main problem is that we probably won’t know the details until the preliminary draw takes place, but what we currently know is that the fourth round will consist of 20 teams playing five groups of four, and the group winners advance to the World Cup. The question is how they’ll get from 53 to 20 teams over the first three rounds, but we do know the first three rounds will consist of home-and-home fixtures between two teams with the winner advancing on aggregate, so it’s just a matter of the exact numbers.

As alluded to above, this is a change from CAF’s previous format, which saw 5 head-to-head ties to determine who went to the 2014 World Cup, which dearly cost Egypt last time around, as they drew Ghana instead of, say, Nigeria or Tunisia. This format should be much more fair.

CONCACAF
The CONCACAF (Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Football) an party began back in March with the first round, and the winners from that advancing to the second round. Both consisted of head-to-head, home-and-home matches with the winners advancing on aggregate. Four of the fourteen teams from the first round made it through: Belize, Barbados, Nicaragua, and Curaçao. Canada, El Salvador, Guatemala, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Grenada, and Antigua and Barbuda entered in the second round and also advanced, joining Jamaica and Haiti in the third round. The draw for this round, also consisting of head-to-head matches, will take place on July 25. CONCACAF’s fourth round will consist of twelve teams contesting three groups of four, with the top two teams from each group advancing to the fifth round, the famous Hexagonal. CONCACAF’s top teams enter at this point: the four World Cup teams from last year (Costa Rica, the US, Mexico, and Honduras) plus Panama and Trinidad and Tobago. The draw for this round will also occur on July 25, meaning that the head-to-head winners’ groups will be pre-determined. The third round will commence on August 31st, and the fourth round no earlier than November 7th. (Yes, this means the US will begin World Cup qualification in November.)

As the name implies, the Hexagonal will feature six teams. The top three will qualify for the World Cup, with fourth places will play in an inter-confederation playoff, with the opponent to be determined. In 2013, Mexico’s (hilariously) woeful qualifying campaign was saved because CONCACAF had drawn the OFC as its opponent, which meant playing New Zealand instead of Uruguay. (Mexico probably would’ve beaten AFC’s Jordan as well, but there were a lot of teams Mexico was supposed to beat in that campaign.)

CONMEBOL
The Confederación Sudamericana de Fútbol represents South America, with the exception of Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana. One of only two confederations to ever win a World Cup (along with UEFA, which represents Europe), this is the strongest confederation in the world (by average strength). It’s hard not to argue that usually half its members qualify for the World Cup. Its qualifier format is dead simple: ten teams play a double round-robin. The top four directly qualify, with the fifth place plays in, and usually wins, an inter-confederation play-off. Play will begin this October and continue through 2017.

OFC
The Oceanic Football Confederation consists of New Zealand and a bunch of tiny Pacific island nations. The time around, the OFC has decided to double up their continental cup tournament with their World Cup qualifiers, likely to prevent a repeat of what happened last time when New Caledonia  pulled off a shock upset of New Zealand. Tahiti than beat New Calendonia and went to the 2013 Confederations Cup, whereupon they suffered the worst ever loss in a FIFA-sponsored tournament and finished group play with a -23 goal differential. (The Confederations Cup acts as a “warm up” of sorts for the World Cup and is played in the host country the year before. The entrants are the host, the previous World Cup winner, and the winners of each confederation’s cup tournament, hence the name.)

OFC qualification will get under way in late August to determine the best of American Samoa, the Cook Islands, Samoa, and Tonga. The winner will advance to the second round, where the winner will join the rest of the confederation’s teams, split into two groups of four, with round-robin home-and-home matches beginning in October. The top two teams from each group will advance to the final round, which will be played in similar fashion starting in August 2016. The winner will then advance to the 2017 Confederations Cup and play in the inter-confederation playoff for a shot at the World Cup.

UEFA
Last, and most assuredly not the least, is the Union of European Football Associations. UEFA qualification will begin last, as the confederation is currently conducting its qualifiers for the European Championships next year. However, the draw for its World Cup qualifying will still occur on July 25th (when else?). The 52 teams competing for spots will be divided into nine groups (seven groups of six and two groups of five). The nine group winners will qualify directly for the World Cup, while the eight best runner-up will play-off for the four remaining spots. Qualification will get underway in September 2016.

That’s pretty much it for now! Expect more news after the draw on July 25th.

The 2015 Women’s World Cup Starts Today

I haven’t talked about this nearly enough, so here’s a quick post to kick it off. (Er, no pun intended.)

Later today, the 2015 edition of the Women’s World Cup starts, with Canada and China starting at 6:00 Eastern on FS1.

“Why should I watch?”, you may find yourself asking. Well, here are my reasons:

  • It’s more soccer! International soccer is my favorite kind of soccer, and in the international game meaningful games of any sort are rare. 
  • U-S-A! U-S-A! Unlike on the men’s side, where the US is generally thought of as scrappy underdogs trying to prove themselves against the world’s European and South American elite, in the women’s game we are the elite. While rooting for the underdog is fun, this is your chance to root for a front-runner.
  • It’s on during the day! Yes, unlike the next two men’s World Cups, this one is taking place in US timezone-friendly Canada. (Well… probably.) Games will generally start in prime time during the week, at least if you’re on the East Coast.
  • This is not a “yes, but did you explain how the women’s superior fundamentals makes up for their inability to dunk?” situation. While the women’s game isn’t as deep as the men’s (in terms of the competition), there are still a lot of good players out there who can cross and hit the through-ball as well as anyone. I watched the last World Cup and the Olympics (where the women field full-strength sides, unlike the men) and enjoyed it thoroughly.
  • Besides, do I really need to give you any more reasons to skip work again this summer and down some beers and wings? I think not.

So, yeah, get out there and enjoy some soccer.

The 2018 World Cup Begins Tomorrow

Your response to the headline may well be “huh”, to which I will say, “let me explain”.

As previously explained on this website, the World Cup technically includes both the part you watched last summer and the qualifying tournament that precedes it (hence why the former is sometimes known as the “World Cup Final”).

Starting tomorrow, 12 teams from the Asian Football Confederation will play the first of two games that, on aggregate, determines who will advance to the next round of the AFC’s qualifiers. Suffice it to say, seeing as how these are the 12 lowest ranked teams from the AFC the odds of any of them appearing in Moscow three years from is extremely slim. (Indeed, the highest ranked team, India, is ranked 171st in the world according to FIFA’s rankings.) Nonetheless, it is technically the start of the tournament. The matches below will be played March 12th and 17th, with the first home team listed first:

  • India vs. Nepal
  • Yemen vs. Pakistan
  • Timor-Leste vs. Mongolia
  • Cambodia vs. Macau
  • Chinese Taipei vs. Brunei
  • Sri Lanka vs. Bhutan

Just for fun, I’ll do the usual advancement scenarios next week, as well as preview the beginning of CONCACAF’s qualifiers later this month. Also look out for a post explaining all of 2018 World Cup qualifying, though that may have to wait because FIFA hasn’t announced how many bids each confederation will get yet (which has the knock-on effect of UEFA not announcing what their format is going to be yet). Until then!

Bowl Games 2014: Final

And thus, the 2014-2015 college football season is concluded.

My final results are up, but if you don’t want to click the link, then I’ll put it here: I went 23-16 this year (which means I am now 274-220 overall). I got off to a pretty strong start, but other than going perfect on New Year’s Eve I pretty much faded down the stretch. In particular, New Year’s Day was a disaster for me, as I missed three out of the five games. Afterward, I failed to really recover, going 2-5 down the stretch.

But hey, there’s a reason why I always say, “all predictions wrong”. Nonetheless, I do continue to get more than half of them right. Perhaps next year I’ll start comparing myself against the spread or use other metrics than just wins and losses, but that’ll be determined sometime next December I suspect.

Some closing thoughts on the season as a whole.

  • For starters, my Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets finished eight in the AP Poll, blissfully one spot ahead of Georgia and Tech’s best ranking since finishing ninth after the 1998 season. I never expected this sort of season, but neither did anyone else. Next year, it is unlikely we will surprise anyone. With Justin Thomas returning, I suspect we will start the season ranked in the top 15, and maybe even the top 10.
  • How about those Buckeyes? They committed four turnovers and won by 22, which really means that it wasn’t even that close.
  • Will we see a shift in the perception of the power five conferences after this? I believe that we’re back to some real parity in college football. The only way we can really tell, though, is if we get more power five teams playing each other during the season. We’ll see how that shakes out when we do our usual out-of-conference schedule rankings. Suffice it to say, though, reports of the Big Ten’s death were greatly exaggerated.

And with that, this site will be mostly dormant again through the spring and summer. That said, do look for some content relatively soon, as arguably my favorite part of the World Cup will start up again this spring: qualifying.

Until then.

Bowl Games 2014: The Big One

And here it is.

While I don’t think a four-team playoff is really ideal, this is the closet we’ve got for now in major college football. Let’s enjoy it for what it is.

As usual, all times Eastern and all predictions wrong.

Monday, January 12
8:30: Oregon vs. Ohio State (College Football Playoff National Championship @ Arlington, TX; ESPN): There are better, and more in-depth, previews than I can provide here. But I’ll high the highlights. For starters, let’s talk about the games that proceeded this one.
I think most of us expected Oregon to beat Florida State, but goodness I don’t think anyone expected the annihilation that occurred, largely of FSU’s own doing. It’s hard to survive five turnovers against anyone (where was that against us in the ACC title game?), but against the most efficient offense in the country? Forget about it.
Ohio State over Alabama will be the upset of the year, provided the Buckeyes lose this game. Like many others, I gave them no shot, what with their backup-backup quarterback against a Nick Saban defense. Forget about it, right? Well, not so much. Ohio State go off to a slow start, but they came out in the second half and dominated the game.
What’s at stake for these teams? For Oregon, it has to be a little validation, I would think. In their current run of success (with Pac-10/12 titles in 2009, 2010, 2011, and this season), the national title has eluded the Ducks. They made the title game in the 2010 season, only to be beat by Cam Newton and company, starting the narrative that they just weren’t tough enough to challenge the all-mighty SEC. Indeed, I can’t help but wonder if Duck partisans feel a bit cheated that their path to the national title won’t have Alabama or any other SEC school in it.
For Ohio State, in many ways, this is a team that is almost playing with house money, which feels a bit weird to say about a team with the sort of historical success they Buckeyes have had, but hear me out. This is the second season since the 2012 team that went 12-0 but was on sanctions. No one gave them any chance after they lost Braxton Miller, and then no one gave them any chance after the loss to Virginia Tech. (Indeed, the weirdest thing about reading recaps of that game are the bits about how it’s a solid victory for VPI and a way for them to get back in the national discussion. Uh, not so much, as it turns out!) No one gave them a chance to beat Alabama. Yet, here we are.
As for the game itself, I expect points. These two teams boast two of the most efficient offenses in the nation. Their defenses are also pretty similar, though the Big Ten still has enough plodding offenses to skew the numbers somewhat. Overall, I came in thinking this one was going to be hard to call, and the research I have done so far has only supported this. I guess this is true of most games, but this one is really going to come down which team plays better tonight. I think Oregon is still slightly better, so that’s going to be my guess.
Confidence: not applicable, as to win the group I’m in I have to pick strategically and go with Ohio State.
Previous meetings: Eight, actually, and Ohio State has won all of them. The first was all the way back in the 1957-58 Rose Bowl, which the Buckeyes won 10-7. Apparently they hit it off, as the two teams met in the regular season four time in the 60’s. Another home-and-home occurred in 1983 and 1987, but that was it until Ohio State’s 26-17 upset of Oregon in the 2009-2010 Rose Bowl.
Last bowl game: This is Oregon’s tenth straight bowl game, going back to a 17-14 loss to Oklahoma in the 2005 Holiday Bowl. They beat Texas 30-7 in last season’s Alamo Bowl. Thanks to their 2012 sanctions, Ohio State didn’t go to a bowl that year despite going 12-0. If they had, their bowl streak would stretch back all the way back to the 1989 season. Instead, their streak is now two, and last year they lost to Clemson in the Orange Bowl, 40-35.
Announcers: Chris Fowler and Kirk Herbstreit