Thailand in Oceania?

Thats so funny.

Your a joke if thats what you think?
Everyone knows if you had 13 teams from one confed it would maximize your confeds chances of having atlest one team in the finals... HELLO McFly any one home>?

A few more than 1 team though isnt there, more like domination.� Put your head back in the sand, Europe deserves the number of places it has.

I disagree with the writer's point about Asia getting more places. Their quota was increased after 2002, based on Korea's semi final run. It was conveniently ignored that Korea and Japan were seeded in their groups, and that China failed to score, and Saudi were beaten 8-0 in one game.

In 2006, no Asian team got past the 1st round.

Asia haven't had their quota " effectively reduced" by Australia's entry. The fact that the best team in Oceania can walk through Asian qualifying unbeaten makes more of a case for an automatic Oceania spot than it does for extra Asian ones.

mmm. .. I think that people would have to consider that had Australia been in the AFC for previous WC quailfiers what impact that would have done to their domestic scene and the world stage.

IHMO, had Australia been part of AFC qualifiers they would have probaby consistently qualified and would possiblity have better FIFA placing and considered a stronger competiter and not be underestimated. Therefore it would be assumptive to think that past statistics has any irrelevence espencially now that Australia is in AFC.

I also think people have to consider the "home" advantage that UEFA and Amercias had when hosting the WC closer to the home confederations, their experience of playing in the terriority is very important. Just ask the French Team of the 2002 World Cup finals. AFC and CAF has the disadvantage of not winning as much since it is off their home confederation for many WCs until 2002 (I suppose that we could include 1994 USA). Counting also that even UEFA team have problems in CONMEBOL and CONMEBOL teams have problems in UEFA as well, should we be surprised?

Now having established the strength of home advantage to the prespective confederations. Can it be possible that we can argue that AFC or CAF are not deserving of their qualifier slots when there obvious disadvantages in the past records in the World Cup finals???? In which case, I think that if we are to base qualifier slots to how comparatively well one performs in the World Cup finals is a much weaker line of reasoning than we care to admit but nevertheless on the surface it appears to the only strong enough case compared to any other explainations there is, or does it?? I also think that poor v rich countries and the ranking/rating system have quite an influence on the qualifers slots to a certain indiscerting degree.

All in all, we are part and parcel of the variablitity of the distance and environment that has affected travelling teams over the time and it still plays a part today whether we like it or not. but i am not going to factor this in as it is a really massive formula for a insignificant change.

................................................

My point is that everyone is basing their assumptions on the different teams performance in the WC final 32 - when it is more relative to consider how they got to the final 32 by preliminaires in respect to playing strengths and volume of participating countries.

Any talk about how well teams have done in the finals is actually very weak as it really explores the high level depth of the confederation rather than determine allocated 32 places by preliminaires.

Ok the following is not for the mathematical challenged. So if you lost, I am sorry. But it is hard enough to justify without some maths. And this is only to have two main variable concepts involved and it took me literally the whole day to explain this as clearly as I can. If there were any another significantly and equally assumed concept to be involved here, I would assume that it would take me literally a week at least to conceptise and clearly explain it as it would become 3 dimensional rather than 2 dimensional. But there is no other significant third concept to worry about as far I see. If you do somewhat find one, I would just say it is insignificant compare to the main two and that I am only formulating a basic mathemathical theoretical model with comments.

I could only assume that in order to be accurate, we have to consider two main concepts. The first concept being the number of participating countries in respect of the different confederations (quantity). The other concept being the playing strengths (quality) of each confederation. It is always best and have less problems starting at quantity and then working out quality as it simply does not work the other way mathematically wise.

[if you quality it and then quantity it then you have qualitate a smaller sample size and disregard aspects of others that is outside the small sample size and but yet is part of the quantity that is to be included. By starting with quantity, it would incorporate all relevent data and then by qualitate afterwards, it would cut off irrelevant data. You get me? This is why the bias in the way FIFA allocated places falls completely down, FIFA starts a quality basis first (eg europe and south amercia playing strengths) and then quantity (the other confederations and participating countries). It has no mathematical justification.]

Even if we to consider to evenly spreading the places according to the volume of teams in each confederation it is still unfairly justified in an uneven playing field.

. . . Although it would be ideally justifed in an even playing field. So we have to assume that both concepts are of equal weight.

Lets consider current volume of FIFA registered team per confederation as a starting point and work from an even playing field viewpoint. So this is a quantity calculation at this stage.

UEFA: 52 (25.37%)
CAF: 52 (25.37%)
OFC: 11 (5.27%)
AFC: 45 (21.95%)
CONCACAF: 35 (17.07%)
CONMEBOL: 10 (4.87%)

205 members

In a 32 team World Cup Final this leads to the following theoretical allocation:

UEFA: 8.12 approx 8
CAF: 8.12 approx 8
OFC: 1.7 approx 1.5
AFC: 7.00
CONCACAF:5.46 approx 5.5
CONMEBOL:1.56 approx 1.5

Actual/Eventual Allocation At Recent WC:

UEFA: (14)14 includes host.
CAF:5
OFC: (0.5)1
AFC: (4.5)4
CONCACAF: (3.5)4
CONMEBOL: (4.5) 4

Notable differences between actual allocation and countries theoretical allocation:

UEFA 14 is 4 more than the theoretical allocation 8
CAF 5 is 3 less than theoretical 8
OFC 0.5 is 1 less than theoretical 1.5
AFC 4.5 is 3 less than theoretical 7
CONCACAF 3.5 is 2 less than theoretical 5.5
CONMEBOL 4.5 is 3 more than theoretical 1.5

It is then understandable that it is normally consider by FIFA that UEFA and CONMEBOL has a stronger playing power than the others than by volume of participating countries The question is how much stronger in the nature of the volume of participating countries in the preliminaires?

Now lets look at using a FIFA ranking system or Elo rating system to compare. That is, start looking at quality.

Now taking FIFA rankings of the top 32 teams
UEFA has 17 teams
CAF has 7 teams
OFC has 0 teams (Aus went up to 33 and not counted in the 32)
AFC has 0 teams (Japan & Korea are the highest ranked but are still much lower as a result of losing WC games, despite making it to the final 32)
CONCACAF has 2 teams
CONMEBOL has 6 teams

Looking at the teams listed I would have to say that like the AFC example given above, that there teams which are high ranked even though they did not get in the WC finals compared to teams that are punished for losing in the group stages of the WC. A huge problem here. Don't like the weighting of different confederation bias in the ranking system as it has no solid theoretical grounding mathematically wise.

So by current playing form and less bia of different confederations and less historical bias, I have go to the Elo rating (with theoretical mathematical grounding) as of this date of posting. There are only significant bias to the last 30 recent matches for countries' overall strength and stronger bias are to the more recent games. It is based on a mathematical rating system with no significant exceptions

But for the sake of time and not going off topic, I will not bother press the point, just read my posting on the FIFA ranking thread to understand the maths behind Elo rating. It just a tighter and plausible mathematical formula with the correct variables comparing to FIFA's formula that is bias variables built-in and pucked out of thin air.

The Elo rating provides the following:

UEFA has 17 teams
CAF has 4 teams
OFC has 1 (Aus since they played as OFC)
AFC has 1 team
CONCACAF has 2 teams
CONMEBOL has 6 teams

From this viewpoint the FIFA ranking and Elo ratings does not give a proportion representation of the World Cup Finals as being a World Event, bearing in mind of the difficulties between the different countries or enough avaliable games with the right countries or having the time or wealth that could not be truely measured. However I used the Elo rating rather than FIFA ranking as it has a better mathematical theoretical grounding (in order to reduce errors) and less uneven playing field other than rightly allowing proportion weighting by better rating team vs a poor rating team

By mixing the two main concepts of the volume of countries (quantity) and the playing strengths (quality), then I formed the next opinion.

I took the least allocated top 32 places on both counts and made them fixed places and then see how much the remaining left overs places to see whether it is feastible. This is to qualify any common terms/factors between the two main concepts.

Therefore the least allocated places for each confederations are as following:

UEFA has 8 fixed places
CAF has 4 fixed places
OFC has 1 fixed place
AFC has 1 fixed places
CONCACAF has 2 fixed places
CONMEBOL has 1.5 fixed places.(can increased to 2 fixed places by reason of strength)

For simple arguement sake we give CONMEBOL round up with an extra .5 on their obvious strength comparing volume of countries to top 32 ratings. We need whole numbers here.

That has increased 17.5 fixed places to 18 fixed places.

Therefore we still have to sort out the 14 other places. With 18 out of the possible 32 places we are not even within 65% confidence intervals.

Therefore I would have to reject the common allocated places as an infeastible line of justification. What this already proves, is that there is a significant disparities between the two main concepts as parallel concepts.

Therefore, lets try a different tack to reconcile the two main concepts

Reasoning the two main concepts are as follows:

("by volume" refers to the volume of participating countries)

UEFA has 17 teams in the top 32 but by volume they should have 8.12 places
CAF has 4 teams in the top 32 but by volume they should 8.12 places
OFC has 1 team in the top 32 but by volume they should have 1.7 places
AFC has 1 teams in the top 32 but by volume they should have 7 places
CONCACAF has 2 teams in the top 32 but by volume should have 5.46 places
CONMEBOL has 6 teams in the top 32 but by volume have 1.56 places

Lets balance the volume number and placings to determine a compromise into 'like' terms as in (overlapping) linear concept not 'common' terms as in parallel (side by side) concept in the before example.

[Just think of it as having two strands string versus two strands string that is separated]

We can do this by making an average number between the top 32 placed teams in each confederation and the volume of countries playing in each confederation. This is simple process of adding quantity with quality dividing evenly the two concepts (equal strings). This process assumes that both concepts are theoretically equal since there are plenty of pluses and minuses that theoretically evens out in the long term context/bigger picture.

This process will naturally credit a percentage weighting to strengths of each confederation to either volume (quantity) strength or to current playing (quality) strengths of the top 32, whichever has the stronger place value

UEFA: (17 teams + 8.12 places )/2 =12.56 place values
CAF: (4 teams + 8.12 places)/2 =6.06 place values
OFC: (1 team + 1.70 places)/2 = 1.35 place values
AFC: (1 teams + 7.00 places)/2 = 4.00 place values
CONCACAF: (2 teams + 5.46)/2 = 3.73 place values
CONMEBOL: (6 teams + 1.56)/2 = 3.78 plcae values

This is calculated up to 31.48 place values in the WC, which comparable to the usual starting point of 32 places.

Therefore this calculation is in the two-tail error of 0.52 places (32 - 31.48)/2 =0.26 giving an error of 26% in place values. (had we have more than 32 places in the given sample then the error would decrease further- more sample the less error statistically)

This proves that there is an proportional weighting between two main concepts at 74% confidence level. Which would be almost the closest we could theoretical assume until we start rounding to whole numbers and gather up the remaining place values and redistibute the remaining place values to appropriate places.

Lets start rounding to whole numbers for fixed places:

UEFA: 8 fixed places to 12 fixed places with 0.56 remaining
CAF: 4 fixed places to 6 fixed places with 0.06 remaining
OFC: 1 fixed place stays at 1 fixed place with 0.35 remaining
AFC: 2 fixed places to 4 fixed places with 0.5 remaining
CONCACAF: 2 fixed places to 3 fixed places with 0.73 remaining
CONMEBOL: 1.5 fixed places to 3 fixed places with 0.78 remaining

Therefore the revised fixed places in whole numbers are as follows;

UEFA: 12
CAF: 6
OFC:1
AFC:4
CONCACAF: 3
CONMEBOL: 3

Total fixed places = 29 fixed places out of the 32 places.

This leaves 3 places up for grabs for host and playoffs

Therefore at 3 out of the 32 places gives us some recovery of the 26% error.

Calculated as follows: (3/32) x 100 = .09375 or 9.375%

Hence 26%-9.375%= 16.625% error. Which means that we have increased to 83.375% confidence interval from 74%.

Consideration to the host country. Therefore a floating place allocation to the host country means 30 fixed places and 2 places for play-offs.

Making a fair and equable playoff group

Rationale: Even CAF (with the least remains) has 0.06 remaining and so it would be highly feastible that CAF would be weakest with a possible 7th WC rep. But as CAF has a remainer, there is always a possiblity that they could still grab the last two play-off places. Therefore I would allow inclusion of the CAF in the playoffs as with the rest of the Confederations next best placed teams.

I would have the playoffs in the host country of the WC final after the Confederation Cup and before the WC finals.

The countries that will make up the following preliminary playoff group for the last two places:

UEFA's 13th placed team
CAF's 7th placed team
OFC's 2nd placed team
AFC's 5th placed team
CONCACAF's 4th placed team
CONMEBOL's 4th placed team

6 teams playoffs for the last two places.

My theoretical allocation in summary:

Host country: 1 place
UEFA:12.33 places (current WC allocations=14)
CAF: 6.33 places (current WC allocations=5)
OFC: 1.33 places (current WC allocations=0.5)
AFC: 4.33 places (current WC allocations=4.5)
CONCACAF: 3.33 places (current WC allocations=3.5)
CONMEBOL: 3.33 places (current WC allocations=4.5)

With a playoff group of each next best placed teams. Each team will play each other resulting in 5 games each and having the top two of the six entering the World Cup Finals.

Now I am referring to the top 32 places with consideration of the current playing form (via Elo rating) and the volume of participating countries per confederation and not how well a country is placed in the WC finals regardless of being in the group stage only or not. The consideration is who can reach the final 32 teams.


. . . . .
IMHO, looking at my theoretical calculations, I have to say that it turn out very well.

Testing to the theoretical countries to the countries of the recent WC. (Sadly, the only way to test theoretical is with the actual sample.)

It is always going to be debatable but if the teams were placed as I have theoretically allocated it would become something (using each confederation FIFA competition format rules) like this:

Theoretical Countries using my theoretical allocation applied to actual preliminaires:

Host country: Germany

12 placed UEFA countries:Netherlands,Ukraine,Portugal, France, Italy,England, Serbia and Montenegro,Croatia, Poland, Sweden, Czech Republic, and Spain.[with Switzerland in play-offs] (sticking to FIFA premlinaires format rules and not at the knockout stage 2 as the last three happen also to be the three remaining best seconded teams (inclu. Switzerland) as well)

6 placed CAF: Togo, Ghana, Cote d'Ivoire, Angola, Tunisa and Nigeria (by FIFA format rules) [with Sengal in play-offs]

1 placed OFC: Australia [with Solomon Islands in play-offs]

4 placed AFC: Korea, Japan, Iran and Saudi Arabia [with Bahrain in the play-offs]

3 placed CONCACAF: Mexico, USA and Costa Rica [with Trinidad and Tabago in the play-offs]

3v placed CONMEBOL: Argentina, Brazil and Ecuador [with Paraguay in the play-offs]

The final play-off group would as follows:

Switzerland
Sengal
Solomon Islands
Bahrain
Trnidad and Tabago
Paraguay

Out of the group I would have to guess the top two. This is assumed by quality (Elo ratings)I believe that if I choose Switzerland and Paraguay I would not be far off the mark. Although I would think that Sengal especially and even Trinidad and Tabago would challenge them strongly by reason of strength. I would see Bahrain and Solomon Islands being the whipping boys of the play-offs at this World Cup

The eventual difference between my last theoretical 32 and the recent WC 32:

One host country=1
All 13 UEFA countries=13
All 5 CAF plus Nigeria=6
Only one OFC=1
All 4 AFC=4
Only 3 CONCACAF excluding Trinidad and Tabago=3
All 4 CONMEBOL=4

The only difference is that Nigeria is in and Trinidad and Tabago is out.

If. . .

       it been hosted in South Africa instead this time, we can then assume (by quality again) Germany would be in the premlimaries and eventually get there at the expense of Switzerland, with Spain in the play-offs instead and Nigeria in the play-offs as well, at the expense of Sengal.

In my theoretical allocations, the play-off group would makes interesting development and could pull a few upsets, I would imagine.

So what is my conclusion of this?

- The host country should always have an allocated place rather having a set confederation number and remove a completing place if the host is in that confederation.

- OFC should have got a guranteed allocated place rather than a play-off match with the 2nd placed team in the playoffs (Australia would have stayed at OFC, if that was tha case)

- CONCACAF was just right with the 3 guranteed places and was lucky that Trinibad and Tabago won in the play-off match with AFC.

- AFC was just right with 4 allocated places and was unfortunate to lost the playoffs with CONCACAF.

- CONMEBOL should have 3 places and not 4, with the 4th team going in the playoffs, therefore the 5th team should have never be considered as a playoff hopeful.

- UEFA should have 12 places allocated and not 14 places, with the 13th placed team going into the playoffs. Therefore the 14th team should have never even be considered.

- CAF should have an extra allocated place at 6 and have the 7th placed team in the playoffs. The 6th placed team easily be justified as part of the final 32. This means that CAF is able to get to the final 32 with 6 to 7 teams but of course a high enough depth must likely to be lacking if they could not get enough teams to the round of 16.

Summary:

Host                    set at 1 place        - plus 1 place
OFC                     up to 1 place        -plus 0.5 place
UEFA                   down to 12 places -minus 1 places
CONCACAF           down to 3 places    -minus 0.5 place
AFC                    down to 4 places     -minus 0.5 place
CONMEBOL          down to 4 places     -minus 0.5 place
CAF                    up to 6 places        -plus 1 place

Then 6 next best placed teams of each confederation for 2 places in a final play-off group. This would add 0.33 place to each confederation.

If there is a co-host in the same confederation then one place if taken from that confederation and placed to the host. Therefore increasing the host allocated place up from 1 place to 2 places and decrease the rest of the same confederation by 1 place. It is important not to change the final playoff group or it would change the 0.33 place allocated to each confederation for the playoffs.

This place allocation theory is at 83.4% confidence intervals.

It is not saying that the 32 places proportationally allocated to each confederation is 83.4% accurate.

What is says is that in light of each of the last 32 countries in WC final, it represents the 83.4% accurate participatation of each country.

ie Each countries participating is accurately justifyed at 83.4%.

e.g Brazil is 83.4% accurately justified to be at the World Cup Finals or Serbia and Montenegro is 83.4% accurately jusitifed to be at the World Cup Finals or even Switzerland or Paraguay is 83.4% accurately justified to be at the World Cup Finals.

Another way of say that is at any given WC finals, there is 16.6% of inaccurate participation of all countries regardless of confederation so it is expected that 16.6% of countries at the World Cup are not performing as expected (based on their preliminaries forms), whether it is for better or for worse.

Well that is all I have to say on this topic.

:cool:

Hang loose guys

[Originally Posted by Totallyemo
Holy cow, man. You know, in analyzing something you will sometimes come to a point where you need to revisit and revaluate your hypothesis or your data. This should have occurred to you when you noticed the gross "over allotment" of slots to South America. It saves you from wasting much time with calculation, assumptions etc.]


In respect to having the World Cup Finals as a world event with appropiate canditates, it does not necessary mean that these canditates from a certain region would be strong themselves because their next door neigbours is strong. It's like they claiming that they have the same set up as next door and they deserve to go soley on the back of others. The World Cup Finals does not represent the best teams but rather a global contest "for the game of the game" knockout tournment. As you know, in a knockout tournment (even using home and away basis and group systems) the best team does not neccessary get to certain final stages of the contest as they are "knocked out".

To suggest that South America is "over allotment" in their slots is simply not enough, I have to scientifically prove why it is over allocated and be fair in applying the same rule to the others as well. I simply choose to explain by formulation rather argue by using previous performance as justification. Historical performance, as I pointed, are not a really strong incidation to simply reward a region with allocation value, when the team itself had already justifed themselves naturally by doing well and they should not need any extra help because they have proven themselves and should theoretically prove themselves again.

FIFA only realise the significance of "home advantage" and "away" disadvantage when France, the then current World Champion, was packing their bags in the group stage of the 2002 World Cup Final without a win or goal. As consequence, they remove the automatic entry for the next World Cup Champion for the next World Cup Finals in Germany. It is, if anything, a recognition on how strong a knockout tournment it is.

For a knockout tournment, it should always start with an even playing field first rather than a "tweak" for one group above the other, after all there is only 32 places available and to give one group an allocated place is to steal that same place from somewhere else. This the reason why FIFA has considered going from 32 placed finals to a 48 placed finals so they would not steal a place away but reward extra places to developing areas.

However I personally find that such strategy eventually decrease the tournment quality in terms of number of teams and in terms of time period of the knockout tournment, an extra game or extra week would see a decrease in the quality of the better performing teams and start to devalue the tournment on whole with more weaker teams as well. I say the FIFA has to reset the allocation with no prejuice and start allocating by quality and quantity basis as there are different teams for the same country over the four years inbetween WC tournments so there should be no allocation by past performance.

Just remember Greece the current World European Champs were not at the recent WC and that was on the "home confederation" too.


[Originally Posted by Totallyemo
As FIFA has said, they a lot the slots according world cup performances, particularly recent ones. The WC after Cameroon made it to the quarter finals, they added 1 more slot for them, and then again the year after that, if I recall right, even though the overall African WC potential did not increase at all in those years.]

Again, remember France in the 2002 WC finals, they didn't win or score a goal so even the World Cup winners don't get automatic allocation now. So why would allocation be determine by the basis of a certain team performance in a knockout tournment? Hence the inconsistent line of thought surrounding allocation. To get to the final 32 has it's value in itself for allocation but to add great performance of a team in the finals itself is purely unjustified for the next tournment in 4 years time. If they decide to veto the change of nationalities clause, I recoken that certain confederations should start thinking about stacking national teams to favour their confederation, to win places if they decide to veto the change of nationalities clause for players.

[Originally Posted by Totallyemo
And if those rankings, elo and otherwise, were even close to correct, you wouldn't be seeing Czech republic and the USA not even making it out of the group stages. You would also expect that the highest "ranked" African nations, for instance, would at the VERY LEAST qualify for the WC, which most of them did not. Also, using ELO is a bad idea, since we are debating what FIFA is going to do; as far as they are concerned, they have nothing to do with that ranking system.]

Maybe I did not explain clearly. I did say that both Elo ratings and FIFA ranking systems have proportation representation problems. If I would used FIFA ranking system, then because for OFC and AFC have zero countries in the top 32, I would be forced to allocated 1 place for them anyway for statistical purposes keeping real numbers rather than whole numbers. As I explained that I really do not want to prove why the FIFA ranking system is flawed as I have really long winded prove it wrong in another thread about FIFA ranking and I have proved Elo ratings as superior in that thread as well. Elo rating recognise the value of all matches and to the most recent one have a natural wieght and does not accept the regional strength like FIFA does as for the simliar explantion I have explained above (eg why should the value of your match with country A be indirectly influnenced by country B's interconfederation match with country C, when you and country A have nothing to do with country C or country B at all? In other words "What's my neigbours' game got to do this my game?") rather than FIFA way of picking and choosing the best matches of one country and yet the same match is not counted for another country in their calculaion

Let me explain further:

The FIFA rankings that was point derived from the �best seven� games of the years makes the mockery of the other games that was played with terrible results and could not reflect the strength of the team. So if England lost to USA say 5-0 then England does not have to have that game into account as one of the best seven games that they played but yet for the same game USA can claim it as one of their best seven games. Statistically it makes no sense to measure teams strength without considering the weak/worst games as well. It makes certain games less relative in the calculations not reflecting the statistical balance of the ranking system. By this, it means that the top teams can go though the year and lose games but still have seven games that they won very well and accumulates points and retain their rankings. FIFA makes the point of that less active countries playing less games would be at a disadvantage and that is why they have best seven games limit but the reality is that the reverse is true, because it first assumes that the country can play seven games (and many lesser countries can�t arrange decent friendlies) and that countries that are playing more than seven has the greater advantage of choosing the best results with has more weighting, hence giving more points. For an example, if a country plays 15 games and won 10, it disguise the fact that it lost 5 games which accounts for 1/3 of the games played and yet 7 of the 10 they won is accounted for the point system. Such bias weighting will affect points and then rankings. Some countries are still reward for playing more games by allowing them in choosing their best result for points and ranking. Losing 1/3 of the games does not reflect the country�s strength in this case. The point system of FIFA ranking assumes that this country has won the seven games that matters and it is relatively strong, which is obviously not the case.

I rejected FIFA ranking, despite the fact that FIFA uses the ranking system and past WC performance to allocated pots in the premlimaires draws for each confederation. The FIFA system is flawed and really tend to be generally acurruate for the top 8 and even then it may have the ranking order the wrong way round.

As for the Elo rating:

The ELO rating is self -measuring by taking into account of the old rating in the recalculated new rating of the match. This accounts of the status of the match and the rating difference between the two teams plus the difference between the expected result and actual result including the home advantage or not (removes regional strength bias and accounts home support). The points of the games won or lost will immediately adjust the rating rather than waiting for the best seven games played in the current year. It assess the teams rating and how it is relative to the match actually played. The rating does not account for outside influence other than the ranking difference of the two teams involved, the game result and the match status. The rating system does away with the 8 years value influence on points and the biased seven best games. When the new ratings for both teams are calculated after the match, then the rating is compared to the other teams rating and then new ranking is revealed. Historical points value of the past 8 years are not need as the rating is the measured �yard stick� of itself. The new rating reflects the country's strength and assist the the changed rankings relative to the various counties and the old rating within the calculation of the new rating is the historical influence relative to that country. This system accounts the losses and the wins as relative to the rating and consequences of the rankings. The weighting of the match status (e.g. world cup or friendly, etc) should change the rating higher or lower of the game result. This helps with the comparisons between countries and allows more challenges between differently ranked countries as the game affects ratings adjustments rather than accumulating points for ranking. The rating is a clear reflect of the country�s strength and it could be comparable to teams of that country�s past as a comparison rather than the ranking. E.g which number one Brazil side faired better in their time?

Therefore I mathematically accept Elo rating to provide a current ranking order because it is simply very sound and removes bias data that FIFA embrance.

Simply, I use Elo ratings for quality, FIFA ranking does not provide me that quality.

In the competitive nature of the sport there is elite teams that usually gets into the WC finals and then a drop to the 2nd elites and then another drop to a large mixed them up teams that constant changes places and a consistent drop to the terrible teams. Today the top 15 are both the two elite groups (presently the top 3 then the other 12) and after the top 15 there is a gap of the rest down to 55 and a furthur drop for the others. (In 2002 the Top 20 had the top 2 as the very elite and the rest of the elite making up the other 18). The highest "ranked" African team is outside the current top 15 and so struggles to make their presence felt and simply near the top of the rest after the top 15 so was always going to struggle with the rest to make into the WC finals. Remember even in a knockout tournment the best not alway going to be there. Demark are about number 10 and you would have think they be at the 2006, but they weren't. Just look at tennis and you understand how the mighty can fall.

:cool:

Hang loose guys

[Originally Posted by cleazer
Are you saying Chile and Uruguay aren't strong teams? Past results would seem to indicate otherwise. They've certainly been stronger and more consistent performers than any single team from CAF, AFC, or OFC.

And yet they didn't qualify for this World Cup. Because Conmebol doesn't get any many spots as they deserve.

Three of Chile's four matches against Brazil and Argentina during qualification ended in ties, surely they would've performed better than most of the bottom 16 teams at Germany 06.]

other replies to this post. . .

[Originally Posted by Caesar
It's not reasonable to equate matches in CONMEBOL qualifying to matches at the World Cup, because the effect of 'home turf' on results in South America is more pronounced than anywhere else in the world. Chile's record, for example (including against Argentina), is a lot less flattering if you take them out of Santiago - even worse if you take them out of South America. Same for Ecuador & Quito, and Uruguay & Montevideo.

Also to pull out a few results and call them indicative of the general standard of play is misleading. Losses to Peru and Uruguay, a 5-0 drubbing by Brazil and the inability to do anything more than grind out draws at home with teams like Colombia were more indicative of their usual standard in qualifying than their heroics against the Argies.]

[Originally Posted by almango
Uruguay didn't qualify because they couldn't beat someone from the weakest confederation in the world. Chile didn't qualify because they couldn't finish in front of Uruguay. Conmebol has 5 spots available to them, ie thay have the chance for half their members to go to the World Cup. Thats more than enough.]

my reply. . .

Well I am glad that the other posters have practically answer your question before I did, cause I sometimes do tend to overkill with an answer and personally I think I am repeating myself only to re-emphaising the same point in a different form.

I, however, think that right now would be the time to full install to FIFA's global participation policy at the highest level. As I have posted before, that my quantity and quality theoretical allocation of places would allow a fair and justified proportion respresentation at the recent World Cup and would also serve well for the next as well.

Just for fun (OK I am getting a bit nerdy on this)

Lets apply my theoretical allocation to the next World Cup Finals in South Africa:

For the next World Cup 2010 allocations (if taking the latest Elo ratings for ranking on this date may change in late 2007):

CAF HOST:1....................................1 automatic place

For the rest (ie 31/32) of the 32 places (using Elo rating not FIFA plus updated changes of confedation countries)[Total Football Associations: 207]

Formula as follows:

Confed:.......%of participating countries x 31=world allocation,
.................(teams in top 31 + world allocation)/2
.................=world top 31 team mean allocation in World Cup Finals.

Workings

CAF: 52............(25.12% x 31)=7.7872,
......................[4 teams (in top 31)+ 7.7872]/2 =5.894
......................=5 qualifying places 6th & 7th teams in playoffs
UEFA: 52..........(25.12% x 31)=7.7872,
......................[18 teams (in top 31)+ 7.7872]/2=12.894
......................=12 qualifying places 13th & 14th teams in playoffs
OFC: 11...........(5.31% x 31)=1.6461,
......................[0 teams (in top 31)+ 1.6461]/2=0.823
......................=1st & 2nd teams in playoff
AFC: 46...........(22.22% x 31)=6.889,
.....................[0 team (in top 31) + 6.8889]/2=3.444
.....................= 3 qualifying places 4th & 5th teams in playoffs
CONCACAF: 35..(16.91% x 31)=5.2421,
.....................[2 teams (in top 31) + 5.2421]/2=3.621
.....................= 3 qualifying places 4th & 5th teams in playoffs
CONMEBOL: 10.: (4.83% x 31)=1.4973,
.....................[6 teams (in top 31) + 1.4973]/2=3.749
.....................= 3 qualifying places 4th & 5th team in playoffs

HOST:1 automatic place
CAF: 5 preliminary qualifying places
UEFA: 12 preliminary qualifying places
OFC: no preliminary qualifying places
AFC: 3 preliminary qualifying places
CONCACAF: 3 preliminary qualifying places
CONMEBOL: 3 preliminary qualifying places

Giving 27 preliminary qualifying places

Leaving 5 places in the final playoff group[b/]

The following teams make up the 12 teams for the WC finals playoffs.

UEFA's 13th and 14th
CAF's 6th and 7th
OFC's 1st and 2nd
AFC's 4th and 5th
CONCACAF's 4th and 5th
CONMEBOL's 4th and 5th

Have 12 teams to WC finals playoff group for 5 places. It looks more exciting.

For those who prefer FIFA ranking and not Elo rating; here's a quick one

HOST: ........................................................1 automatic place
CAF: (7 teams + 7.7872) /2 = 0.73936 ............7 qualifying places
UEFA (16 teams + 7.7872) /2 = 11.8936 ..........11 qualifying places
OFC: (0 team + . 1.6461) /2 =0.823 ...............no qualifying place
AFC: (0 team + 6.8889) /2 =3.444 .................3 qualifying places
CONCACAF: (2 teams + 5.2421) /2 =3.621 ......3 qualfifying places
CONMEBOL: (6 teams + 1.4973)/2 = 3.749 .......3 qualifying places

So 28 qualifying places and therefore 4 places in the playoffs.

Notice that UEFA has lost two qualifying places and CAF has earn one qualifying place compared to the above.

Having 12 teams to complete in the WC finals playoff group for four places. It still look exciting doesn't it? Have the European and South America teams prove that they should be at the WC finals under either of the above system.

I like having a WC finals playoff group, I have them play after the Confederation Cup and before the World Cup finals in the South Africa. There be many exciting games, I think.

It would be interesting if any of the winners of the playoffs will pass the group stage of the WC and into the round of 16 in the future if such a system was applied.

. . . .

Because each time I look at it and calculate, it look so so so right and fair to me. Does this all make sense to everyone here?

. . .

Well what do you guys think?

:cool:

Hang loose guys.

[Originally Posted by Sagy.
This is my point, the math and logic of this proposal say that CAF earned 6 auto spots. Results of the field show that it did not. When theory and results on the field don�t match chances are that the theory is wrong. A big problem with this proposal is that on field results are ignored.
Unless I�m missing something, these are just claims, but there is nothing to show:
that OFC earned two playoff spots (especially at the cost of CSF 6th+ or UEFA 15th+).
why UEFA earned "no more" than 12 spots (this theory say that they should get 12, but there is nothing to show that the theory is right).
that UEFA or CSF have done poorly away from home continent. In fact, both UEFA and CSF have done well away from their continent - UEFA teams have done well in USA 1994 (7 of 8 finalists) as did CSF in 1998 and 2006 (4 of 5 and 3 of 4 teams in the round of 16). UEFA "bad" performance in 2002 meant that only 9 of 15 teams advanced. This is much better than CAF has done.
CSF results don't agree with your claim. 1998 WCQ the 6th team was 5 points behind the 1st/2nd team (Brazil didn't play) after 16 games hardly a gap, no were near dominance. 2002 WCQ 6th place was 4 points behind 2nd after 18 games. 2006 WCQ 6th place was 4 points behind 3rd after 18 games. Where do you see 3 dominate teams?]

First I better point out that OFC has not got an automatic qualifying place at all.

Secondly, CAF has not have 6 places per ce but 5 places, It just happens that the host is a CAF association. Again, as I said the Host gets 1 allocated place regardless of what confederation it is in, and that stays fixed. It goes with home confederation advantage principle and the allocation place stays with the host country. In the formula, I just calculate the 31 places and not 32 places as the host gets an automatic place.

Thirdly,so having two playoff spot like everyone else is very fair, even at the expensive of CSF 6th and UEFA 15th teams. Are you expecting OFC to participate at all?! If not then OFC might as well not bother having WCQ if there is no place anywhere. Even if you argue one playoff place to OFC, the other playoff is debatable especially if the 2nd OFC team has shown that they were on par with the 1st OFC team for that moment of confederation strength, in those 4 or less years.

The whole idea of the WC playoffs is to sort the remaining confederation strengths by an true interconfederation playoffs. These playoffs also serves a good source of internationals as part of the road before the WC finals, so they would be less friendly games build up other than a few games.

Again you can argue "what if" and "so close but too far" ideas about on-field results after the allocations until you are blue in your face. How the teams from respective confederations do in the WC is not counted, whether in advancing into the round of 16 or not. There many teams from the group stage that didn't make the round of 16 by "what if" and "so close but too far" ideas as well, but that does not hide the the final 31 places are there by merit. It is simply working as evenly as you can get with the same priniciple applied to other confederations. If CSF has very strong 4th and 5th teams teams then they should be able to fly though the playoffs very well and have 5 teams in the WC and there should be no debate as to they deserve to be there. You can't really justify more than that without removing places from other confederation by breaking the two basic and simple priniciples of Quality and Quantity in my formula to get the last 31 places.

What you have, is the problem of Quality versus Quantity and not a reconcilation between the two. In your eyes, you have considered the quality over quantity as the base for your estimations (and they are estimations) and not consider quantity over quality as the counterbase. But it is counterproductive in the long run and does not assess the advance strength of each confederation in the WC finals without proper allocation of places. The interconfederation playoffs serves to reconcilate both quality and quantity indiscretions indiscreetly. If you have the 24 teams as you suggest for the playoff it is too many teams for too little games to justify the quality you are thinking. It is better to be cut throat but fair than to just reasonably fair with less games, or it would be too debatable with "what ifs" and "so close but too far" games but with more games that cover all possible confederation that you can get, there is no debate as to whether all the bases were not covered.

The whole idea of the formula is simply from an even ground perspective that would satisfied every people as deem fair and equal assessment. And the rules that is agreeable for all and not seen it have unfair advantage to any particular confederation as well it gives room for confederations to stake their claims of increased respective strength at that WCQ moment of time as well as showing respective weakness of a confederation as well. My playoffs are a simple design so that such strength and weakness can be show with two teams from each confederation in the playoffs that allows that flexiblilty.

It also means that the best way to get to the tournment is by the local confederation competition. Say if all 10 CSF teams were able to have 5 auto and 5 playoffs, then some teams will not place their best team out for the WCQ and some will only place their best team out for the playoffs because that what they could focus on lesser opponents. Besides, the ranking system that FIFA uses would expect all 10 CSF teams to more local confederation games for points and then it means there are losers with less points within the CSF and so it is impossible for all 10 CSF teams to be in the top 31 ranked places without interconfederation games and that is impossible in a very short time period to get enough games in. It has 6 teams in the top 31 and the other 4 teams remain outside.

[Originally Posted by Sagy.
The theory says that WC results should not impact allocation. This does not mean that the theory is right! In fact this theory give playoff spots to confederations that have not shown that their �next two� teams are viable candidates, and eliminates teams from confederations that have show that they have more than 2 viable playoff teams.]

Is that really that viable? We are talking about a global knockoput competitions that is hugely participated by many associations.

Yes, at the moment you may argue that the second next to best teams of OFC, CONCACAF, CAF and AFC does not deserve to be in the playoff groups because of their "past" results. There are problems with the ranking points that FIFA has in thier system because there are disadvantages to OFC, CONCACAF, CAF and AFC and it is really a poor system, so it pays not to think to highly of it as an viable guide but it is one used currently. Many teams have scrapped good scores againest top world 31 teams but have low ranking as well at it really gets very grey. To use "on-field" is increasingly subjective than objective and is very grey in creating the formulation. the formula can only cover the best likely top 31. I have explained before (have you read my original posting #22 or not? I feel as though I am repeating myself) any team that is in the WC finals as a result of my fomulation, is accurately justified at 83.4% confidence level. That is really far better than current theory and your suggestion of 24 team playoffs with 4 team groups would significantly decrease that confidence levels as the standard deviation is smaller with less games but more teams. By my theory you would only have 16.6% of the countries in the WC finals not performing to their expected results. That is very low. That is also why I would suggest the 48 team WC is an improvement over 32 team WC because it means more games per team with the greater confidence levels as to the final postions of the countries. There are alway some teams that are not representing for confederation and that is included in the 16.6% of non-confidence level at the bottom end of the top 31. It is impossible to decrease this confidence level until there is more teams in the WC finals.

Also there is a reality is that a confederation may strong for a brief few years under the 4 years period between WCs and so this playoff group with the two next best teams from the WCQ can play each other in an interconfederation playoffs to determine that "viable" strength.

Past on-field result in a local confederation competition does not determine interconfederation strength. The interconfederation playoffs serves to reconcilate both quality and quantity indiscretions indiscreetly. Also there are plenty of teams that are on the within range and striking distance of each other from WCQ right up to the round of 16, so your ideas of confederations having more two viable playoff teams loses "solid" ground and becomes more suggestive. So since the WC interconfederation playoffs groups are playing for 5 places with 12 teams that has 2 from each confederation, should be the end point. In the next WC finals, my playoffs numbers from the formula will remain the same and the places allocated to the playoffs may vary according to the current situation. Instead on 5 places, it could be 4 places or it could even be 6 places, depending on an confederation strength changes and change of confederations by country assocations. But usually it would be either 3, 4 or 5 places. It will self-adjust according to the change of circumstances and so there could really hardly be debatable as to whether a Confederation strength is better from what regional as the consequence of the formula will adjust in its automatic allocation and the playoff allocation. Noone really loses out at the end.

[Originally Posted by Sagy.
Even if you are right, and I�m not sure you are right (notice how you, again, ignore on field results), four teams groups is what we have in the WC. As I said above, if it is good enough for the WC, it should be good enough for the WC playoff. When the WC groups stage changes to 6 teams, it will be time to review the playoff system.]

The fact that it could change and be review is enough. It does not have to follow the WC groups stages because it still very sound as itself. Looking at other WCQ games from different confederations you should find different size groups and group allocation lots according to previous WC places and regional positions to give it best even playing field.

If you have your 24 playoff teams, you will have to allocate lots again which will be doubling of the same priniciples and reseting to preWCQ results when they are half way though the WCQ. That is simply rough allocations and cannot be justify. Again it decrease the confidence levels of accurately justified the countries in the WC finals.

By having a simple two next-to-best teams from each confederation is a clear and easy way to sort out. This case it would be sorted by having the teams to play interconfederation games and not to play in your own confederation. Also this is the best way to keep the confidence levels as high as you can.

The groups can be sorted by confederation strengths and team ranks of each confederation. This is where quality can dominate over quantity.

For the used example

The playoffs consist of

UEFA's 13th and 14th
CAF's 6th and 7th
OFC's 1st and 2nd
AFC's 4th and 5th
CONCACAF's 4th and 5th
CONMEBOL's 4th and 5th


The order of confederation strength by quality vs quantity of countries

Determine by ratio of teams in the 27 theorical quailtying places
(in this WC not including host) to % of participating countries applied to 31 teams

CONMEBOL 3/4.87=0.616
UEFA 12/25.37=0.473
CAF 5/25.37=0.197
CONCACAF 3/17.07=0.176
AFC 3/21.95=0.137
OFC 0/5.27=0

I would sort Groups A and B as the following:

In Group A: strongest confed 1st team, weakest confed 2nd team, 2nd strongest confed 2nd team, 2nd weakest confed 1st team, then 3rd strongest confed 1st team, next 3rd weakest confed 2nd team

In Group B: strongest confed 2nd team, weakest confed 1st team, 2nd strongest confed 1st team, 2nd weakest confed 2nd team, 3rd strongest confed 2nd team, 3rd weakest confed 1st team.

Group A

CONMEBOL 4th
OFC 2nd
UEFA 14th
AFC 4th
CAF 6th
CONCACAF 5th

Group B

CONMEBOL 5th
OFC 1st
UEFA 13th
AFC 5th
CAF 7th
CONCACAF 4th

[Originally Posted by Sagy.
I�m not asking you to change your mind or your theory, I�m just trying to explain to you why some people (myself included), find the theory and the formula lacking.]

Thanks, it helps reinforced arguements and train of thought to basic and simple priniciples. The counterarguements that you presented has the weakness of over assessing on-field results on local confederation and the results in WC finals as means of WC allocation. In which I explained has been disproven by "on-field" case examples like France in 2002 and S&M in 2006. By sticking to the success of teams of the same confederation, like 3/4 teams from CSF advanced to next stage, does not suggested that 5th and 6th teams would be avoid being bottom of the group either.

[Originally Posted by Sagy.
Again this is an unsubstantiated claim. If CSF can get 10 teams in the world top 31 they should be able to send all their teams to an expanded playoff, each of these teams has earned it, why should they lose the chance just because of geographical location?]

As I said above, it is actually statisitically impossible to get all 10 teams in the world top 31 places simply because there are always losers in a local confederation competition that makes it virtually impossible to get a high ranking with the lesser teams into the top 31. I have really previously over estimate by taking it to the very extreme that it was not possible statistically wise. (I think I was trying to drive a point home but this following explaination is clearer and better for you.) It may be possible that a CSF 7th team may get to the top 31 and then that means that the other 3 would have to lose virtually everything and drop down the ranking in order to get the 7th team up and some of the other 6 top teams would have to drop out of the top 15 to get the 7th team really up. So really, it was already reasonably hard but acheivable enough to have the 6th team in the top 31 from CONMEBOL.

If the 7th team was able to get in the top 31, then the 4th team would get a qualifying place and the 5th and 6th team would be in the playoffs and that would have been self-sorted out naturally by my formula because it was based on quality as delivered by the rankings. The problem for CSF is actually the limited 31 places in the WC tournment and the fact that are other 5 confederations to consider. If there was less confederation, then there could be more allocation places for CSF statisitically speaking.

Also by assertion of keeping geographical location/size of Confederation is that it would not enpoach the another allocation place from the other Confederations. Until there is an increase of participating countries in the actual WC finals from 32 to 48 there is very little leeway to allow CSF lower team a place or two. Again, there is only 32 teams in the WC finals and that it mathematical statistically impossible to increase CSF confederation allocated places when there is five other confederations, in which four of confederation is very large. The only other possible way to increase more CSF teams in the WC is to increase the number of teams that CSF has and that is very unlikely.

[Originally Posted by Sagy.
Your formula might be final but that doesn�t make it right. No one is trying to get you to change your formula. I�m just trying to explain to you why this formula is a relatively poor one. I make this claim since the results that it produces do not match what we see on the field. As I said above, when this happens chances are that the result on the field are right and the formula is wrong. As far as I can tell, the counter claim is that the allocation is right since the formula produced it and the formula is final.]

The past "on-field" that you have quoted are already based on very poor priniciples of allocation. You can say that it is relatively poor formula because of result that it produces but the reverse can be said for it as well by results. There is no real substantial objective arguement that you placed forward. No offense, but including certain results over other results by one-off games is not applicable.

There is no logic to it. Team A wins againest B who wins againest C, B also wins againest D and but since D wins againest A and A wins againest C, then since D therefore D is very strong and should be allocate a spot, but what about teams E,F,G and H? from outside the confederation? No one confederation could really be justified as extreme as CONMEBOL without the other confederation inconsideration. And at the WC finals itself is not the venue to justify that because that is the top 31 + host. We are allcoating the top 31 places not justify who advances into the round of 16.

When making a formulation, it is only festible to get the most solid and stable formula that is applicaible to all in a "knockout tournment"

The formula is based on quality and quantity to get the best 31 top knockout teams for the WC finals. So what is this formula "relatively poor" to? Do I have to repeat why "on-field" game results are not relative in determining interconfederation tournment? It is not good statistical maths to include it.

As other posters in this treads has also mention to others, close results based on local confederation competition and results based on what occurs in the previous WC finals is not assessed in the formula nor it should be. It is simple allocation of the best "knockout" teams runing on current form. It is expected some top 31 ranked teams are not going to the WC, some team lose out in the WCQ, some lose out in WCQ playoffs. It is the way the cookie crumbs in "knockouts", there is only so much you can do without losing quality and current form in the WC finals format.

You say that it must be included, but until all teams from one single confederation show that they could past the group stage, the case to prove that they ought to have more in playoffs and/or another allocated place is still very weak in a 32 team knockout tournment plus there is still the problem of the 4 year time period gap between tournments as teams do change. Again you need a 48 team tournment to strengthen your points.

However because of the volume of participating countries that is added each time there is a world cup finals, this allocation will change very quickly if the number of teams playing in WC finals increase from 32 to 48 then we are talking more leeway for smaller sized Confederaton. And CSF would be more accurately justified in having 4 or 5 qualifying places plus playoffs.

I do agree that the tournment to increase to 48 teams as there are now 207 FIFA football associations now. This would appropripately adjust according to the quantity in the formula.

Notice the formula would not need to change for the increase in numbers in the tournment or even decrease of numbers as the fomula is quite clear in sorting the teams still. Although subjectively the competition has become more cut-throat at 32 places. 48 places are more divisible by the six confederations than having 32 places.

To have the WC finals at 48 teams is more to the CSF advantage overall beacuse of the increase of FIFA assocations and the quality side of the formula would work appropiately to expand with any CSF high rankings proporationally along with the other confederations and translate it to the final 48 team places.

In this Formula, because there is only 6 confederation, he interconfederation playoffs still serves to reconcilate both quality and quantity indiscretions indiscreetly and so the current conditions also remain the same.

Whether the number of places in the WC tournment increase or decreases, the formulation calcualation still does not change only the numbers. And so the proportational representation is still based on quantity and quality the all opponents regardless of "what ifs", "so close but too far" and "one off field results.

I better leave this here. Another way to expand on the reasoning is to prove by expanding the WC finals from 32 teams to 48 teams as an effective way to accurately justified the team participating in the WC finals. ie increase the confidence levels the best as you can with about 207 associations that existed now. Anything more than the 48 team format would be impractical and decrease confidence levels.

Unless you have any more practical devil advocate for me to consider. It is getting long but you have made some points. There is only so much points to protest and that such points are not as significant as the priniciples I have pointed out. The whole idea is to present a formula with simple fundamental priniciples that can be applied to all in a fair and equable environment. There is alway going to be goaning but there is a need to justify the allocation. Outside this formula is the problem with the FIFA ranking system, however I have pulled it apart in another thread and vaildated mathematically the Elo rating as statistically viable and sound formula.

Do you have another formula for me to consider? Or else there no grounds to justify your reasoning. Using matches results is not good enough. It does not really move mountians but making fundamental principles in a form of a formula is better than a series of anecdotal results that has less solid ground to stand on.

:cool:

Hang loose guys.

AWB breaks his own record for longest post.

Did anyone bother to read that?

Not to sure Australia would agree but what about ...this idea for Thailand:

ASEAN + Australia break away from the AFC and merge into the new ASEAN-Pacific Confederation.

Well if NZ wins the playoffs, that will make a very strong case for OFC automatic spot as that would be back-to-back OFC spot in the World Cup Finals. Despite the Confederation Cup weak point. The next progressive move would have OFC a place in one of the final two AFC groups and going through the final qualifying rounds of AFC. Which will help us plenty with decent matches.