Here they go again

**RyckyRych** · Sep 13th, 2012, 01:19 PM

Qualifying for the 2014 World Cup as started? There is a chance some countries won't even exist anymore by that time. Maybe its me, but a team can change their level of play so much in two years, for better or worse. Is this really the best way to select the best 32 teams?

I just don't get soccer.

**Tim** · Sep 13th, 2012, 04:27 PM

Well, this ain't the "World" Series of Baseball we're talking about.

Football is the global game and since there's only room for 32 countries, the best nations need to qualify. How else do you decide who should play?

It's two years until the tournament but qualifying will be completed by October 2013 for most countries and this will consist of only ten games for most European qualifiers, two of which were played in the past week.

As for teams changing over the course of two years; that's not really the case. The majority of the players who are playing now will still be around in 2014. A few youngsters might burst through in the next year or so, and some old dogs might retire, but by and large it will be the same group.

**RyckyRych** · Sep 13th, 2012, 05:00 PM

The qualifying is fine... it just takes up too much calendar, at least for me. Just seems like the qualifying should occur IN 2014, not 2012 or 2013. OK, maybe late 2013 is needed.

Now I have no idea how many countries try to qualify. I assume the US moved on with the Jamaica win, but when do they play next? I have no idea.

**J_Verschueren** · Sep 13th, 2012, 07:01 PM

Qualifying is done in a "poule"-system, i.e. per continent countries are split into groups, who then all play eachother home and away. Teams score 3 points for a win, 1 for a draw and 0 when they lose. When all the matches are complete, the two teams with the most points advance to the next round and so on until we're down to 32 qualifiers for the main event. It's safe to say USA will have to play some more matches + intercontinental play-offs before going to Brazil.

Not much of a soccer fan myself, but I did have a look at The Official Website of the FIFA World Cup recently and, off the top of my head, Europe has 6 groups of 5 countries, Africa has 10 of 4 and I don't remember the other continents. There's a lot of matches to be played. Almost a thousand, if I recall correctly, to get down to the Word Cup. So, indeed, it's a matter of scale.

**RyckyRych** · Sep 13th, 2012, 08:16 PM

I looked at some of this. I understand how it all works, it just feels really drawn out.

One thing I didn't take into account was availability of the players. I'm sure many are in the various leagues (Premeir, Champion, MLS, whatever) so they likely have to try to get around that.

Still, the prelims started in 2011 and 3-6 months go by between the different rounds or part of rounds. Then again, I do see a TON of teams, I want to say over 200? That is quite an undertaking considering where these players could be on clubs all around the world.

The more I look at and think about it, I can see how it would be an almost constant process. Seems that almost as soon as the 2010 ended, the 2014 began. Throw in the Olympics and it does become very messy.

Still drives me crazy that a tourney takes 4 years to play. Prehaps thats why it has become the event that it is for a lot of these countries.

**TIME** · Sep 13th, 2012, 11:27 PM

Originally Posted by Tim

Well, this ain't the "World" Series of Baseball we're talking about.

LMFAO

**Tim** · Sep 14th, 2012, 12:28 AM

Originally Posted by J_Verschueren

Not much of a soccer fan myself....

I don't think Belgium have made it to a World Cup since 1990, but you have some top class players at the moment. I expect to see them in Rio.

Originally Posted by RyckyRych

One thing I didn't take into account was availability of the players. I'm sure many are in the various leagues (Premeir, Champion, MLS, whatever) so they likely have to try to get around that.

Exactly.

Originally Posted by RyckyRych

Seems that almost as soon as the 2010 ended, the 2014 began. Throw in the Olympics and it does become very messy.

Still drives me crazy that a tourney takes 4 years to play. Perhaps thats why it has become the event that it is for a lot of these countries.

The qualifiers have only just started, over 2 years since the last World Cup. It doesn't take 4 years to play - it's a tournament every 4 years. I know football isn't hugely popular in the US (although it is more popular than it used to be) but it is practically everywhere else in the world.

Originally Posted by TIME

LMFAO

Baseball = glorified rounders

**J_Verschueren** · Sep 14th, 2012, 01:34 AM

Originally Posted by Tim

I don't think Belgium have made it to a World Cup since 1990, but you have some top class players at the moment. I expect to see them in Rio.

Since the WC was first organised in 1930, we've qualified 11 times, our best streak being 1982-2002, when we qualified for each tournament. Granted, after 1990 we never had any sort of impact, but we were there until 2002 (according to Wikipedia... I'm proud to say I did have to look that up).

The state of soccer in Belgium recently used to be shocking and even now I feel most players just don't have the work-ethic displayed by other nation's players, but the current selection seems eager at least. I don't want them to qualify, just because I don't want to deal with jacked-up soccerfans putting pressure on me to give a shit about the whole deal, but they just might.