Day -736. WorldCup2018
Something popped into my head which, as a football fan, I've been
trying to ignore thinking about for a while. It's a bit like an exam you
had at school in a subject which you hated and you put off studying it
forever and when you did think about it you quickly calculated that
there were still two more days to go before you had to really start
working on it. Maybe it wasn't exactly like that but that thought came
into my head which replaced the original issue which I was trying to
ignore getting said head around, and I just went with it.
Here it
is. A while ago, Michel Platini, in his glory days of president of UEFA
announced a innovative new qualifying format for the 2020 Euros which
would also have some bearing on the 2022 World Cup qualifying. It
sounded very much like the Champions League for countries, but of course
UEFA denied the more matches on TV had anything to do with increased
revenue. In a nutshell it involves a Nations League split into 4
divisions based on the countries' rankings at the end of the 2018 World
Cup qualifying. Then the understanding of it kind of falls apart for me.
There are two sets of play-offs, one in June 2019 and another in March
2020, the winners of which somehow join the other teams that will go
through the regular group qualifying which is still happening. UEFA's
selling point of this is that it eliminates meaningless friendlies (all
matches will be competitive) (agreed) and it gives small countries the
opportunity to qualify. Apparently the winners of the bottom division
will secure a spot at the Euros in 2020. So that's good news for
supporters of minnows like Malta and Scotland.
I read through it
all again, including on UEFA's website and I have to confess I am none
the wiser. I thought writing it out would make it easier for me and I
would be able to explain it all for you. But not yet. I've got another
two and a half years to go and I'm sure in that time the BBC will have
one of their simple "Euro qualifying explained" diagrams. I can’t wait
to see how they simplify this. UEFA's diagram has my head spinning.
In other quick news, USA have had enough of these boring 0-0's and
1-0's in their own backyard and have beaten Costa Rica 4-0 in the Copa.
There'll be lot of "USA! USA! USA-ing! tonight.
Tomorrow we will know the finalists of the OFC Nations Cup. Will hosts PNG be hosting New Zealand in the final?
Older news but since Kosovo and Gibraltar became members of Fifa in
May, they will have to be included in the 2018 World Cup qualifying, the
draw for which was made a while ago. There are two groups of 5 (the
rest have 6 teams) which they will be drawn into. In the case of
Gibraltar it probably won't make much of a difference as they will be
the bottom team. But Kosovo could be more tricky opposition, especially
if they win what could be a very interesting legal battle to have
players born in Kosovo who since played for other countries, because
Kosovo wasn't a country, now come back and play for Kosovo.
Tuesday, 7 June 2016
Monday, 6 June 2016
National Anthem? Any one will do.
Day -737. WorldCup2018
Ah well. It's just the wrong bit of music. Who really knows anyway? The people watching on TV? Nah? The fans in the stadium? It's in the US. They probably think the wrong music is all part of some "pre-game show".
Yesterday, before the Uruguay-Mexico match at the Copa America, as the teams lined up for the National Anthems, whoever's job it was to press "Uruguay" on the Anthem playlist hit "Chile" by mistake. Cue bemusement from the players as they readied themselves to belt out their favourite pre-match song. The organisers released a statement and apology today, blaming it on human error. Big discovery there, Sherlock. We didn't think a mouse had escaped from a testing lab, ran across the sound system, saw more coloured buttons to press and thought, "hmm, red looks good".
Now had this happened at the last World Cup in Brazil it wouldn't have been too much of a problem as the fans were always the choir that sang along, no music required.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4WijCK7_26A
Ah well. It's just the wrong bit of music. Who really knows anyway? The people watching on TV? Nah? The fans in the stadium? It's in the US. They probably think the wrong music is all part of some "pre-game show".
Yesterday, before the Uruguay-Mexico match at the Copa America, as the teams lined up for the National Anthems, whoever's job it was to press "Uruguay" on the Anthem playlist hit "Chile" by mistake. Cue bemusement from the players as they readied themselves to belt out their favourite pre-match song. The organisers released a statement and apology today, blaming it on human error. Big discovery there, Sherlock. We didn't think a mouse had escaped from a testing lab, ran across the sound system, saw more coloured buttons to press and thought, "hmm, red looks good".
Now had this happened at the last World Cup in Brazil it wouldn't have been too much of a problem as the fans were always the choir that sang along, no music required.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4WijCK7_26A
Sunday, 5 June 2016
OFC and Copa....and Toronto
Day -738. WorldCup2018
Every World Cup little booths pop up around Toronto selling flags of every country in the World Cup, plus of course the Canadian flag for those people who seem determined to say, "I a Canadian and am going to stand up to all you Portuguese/Italian/Brazilian/English etc flag waving soccer supporters", even though that Canadian is probably of Portuguese/Italian/Brazilian/English etc. descent. But these parking lot salesman have also popped up this year with the Copa America and the Euros going on this month. And of course there are more countries taking part in both, with it being a special Copa and the Euros having now expanded to 24 teams. More countries, more flags to sell to immigrants from the participating countries and Canadians of descent from said countries. I'm sure Albanian and Icelandic Canadians never thought the day would come when they would be able to participate in the flag-on-the-car fun. And for Hungarian and Northern Irish Canadians, their last participation in a World Cup was before the advent of this enterprising little business.
There are eight country flags missing from all these stalls, those of the participants in the OFC Nations Cup. I may suggest it to my local man in the parking lot, but I do expect him to question whether New Caledonia and Vanuatu are actually countries, and that they play football. "Small islands in the Pacific? Little rocks? How do they have a big enough flat surface to play on?"
One of group of island nations gave another multi-island country a good old hiding at the OFC cup. Hosts PNG walloped Samoa 8-0 and they were in need of a good bumping up of their goal difference. With that win and the draw between Tahiti and New Caledonia, PNG topped their group and moved onto to the semifinals. New Caledonia join them and Tahiti, while eliminated from this competition, will move on to round 3 of World Cup qualifying.
The eight goals that PNG scored were eight times the number of goals scored in all 3 matches at the Copa yesterday. Brazil-Ecuador and Costa Rica-Paraguay were scoreless and Peru beat Haiti 1-0. Exhilarating stuff. I'm sure the Americans are so happy they offered to host this football spectacle. Kissing sister in-laws has been probably mentioned a few times already. So far today Venezuela beat Jamaica.....wait for it....1-0. And Mexico have just gone 1-0 up against Uruguay. It's 10 minutes in so I'm sure there are a lot more goals in that one. Luis Suarez is not playing, so maybe not.
I usually have a funny World Cup memory on Sunday. Today, in honour of the forgotten about OFC Nations Cup it is from the Confederations Cup in 2013. Here is Tahiti's historic goal against Nigeria and the incredible celebrations that followed. It was an amazing moment of glory for them and for the goal scorer, Jonathan Tehau. I shouldn’t remind you that this was Tehau's second goal of the match. He had earlier scored an own goal. It was 3-0 when he scored at the right end and Nigerian ended up winning 6-1. Small details that shouldn’t spoil their fun.
As an interesting side note, Jonathan Tehau was the oldest of 3 brothers in the squad and they also had a cousin on the team.
Every World Cup little booths pop up around Toronto selling flags of every country in the World Cup, plus of course the Canadian flag for those people who seem determined to say, "I a Canadian and am going to stand up to all you Portuguese/Italian/Brazilian/English etc flag waving soccer supporters", even though that Canadian is probably of Portuguese/Italian/Brazilian/English etc. descent. But these parking lot salesman have also popped up this year with the Copa America and the Euros going on this month. And of course there are more countries taking part in both, with it being a special Copa and the Euros having now expanded to 24 teams. More countries, more flags to sell to immigrants from the participating countries and Canadians of descent from said countries. I'm sure Albanian and Icelandic Canadians never thought the day would come when they would be able to participate in the flag-on-the-car fun. And for Hungarian and Northern Irish Canadians, their last participation in a World Cup was before the advent of this enterprising little business.
There are eight country flags missing from all these stalls, those of the participants in the OFC Nations Cup. I may suggest it to my local man in the parking lot, but I do expect him to question whether New Caledonia and Vanuatu are actually countries, and that they play football. "Small islands in the Pacific? Little rocks? How do they have a big enough flat surface to play on?"
One of group of island nations gave another multi-island country a good old hiding at the OFC cup. Hosts PNG walloped Samoa 8-0 and they were in need of a good bumping up of their goal difference. With that win and the draw between Tahiti and New Caledonia, PNG topped their group and moved onto to the semifinals. New Caledonia join them and Tahiti, while eliminated from this competition, will move on to round 3 of World Cup qualifying.
The eight goals that PNG scored were eight times the number of goals scored in all 3 matches at the Copa yesterday. Brazil-Ecuador and Costa Rica-Paraguay were scoreless and Peru beat Haiti 1-0. Exhilarating stuff. I'm sure the Americans are so happy they offered to host this football spectacle. Kissing sister in-laws has been probably mentioned a few times already. So far today Venezuela beat Jamaica.....wait for it....1-0. And Mexico have just gone 1-0 up against Uruguay. It's 10 minutes in so I'm sure there are a lot more goals in that one. Luis Suarez is not playing, so maybe not.
I usually have a funny World Cup memory on Sunday. Today, in honour of the forgotten about OFC Nations Cup it is from the Confederations Cup in 2013. Here is Tahiti's historic goal against Nigeria and the incredible celebrations that followed. It was an amazing moment of glory for them and for the goal scorer, Jonathan Tehau. I shouldn’t remind you that this was Tehau's second goal of the match. He had earlier scored an own goal. It was 3-0 when he scored at the right end and Nigerian ended up winning 6-1. Small details that shouldn’t spoil their fun.
As an interesting side note, Jonathan Tehau was the oldest of 3 brothers in the squad and they also had a cousin on the team.
Saturday, 4 June 2016
OFC update
Day -739. WorldCup2018
Oh Frank! Fiji lost their final group stage match in the OFC Nations Cup. Vanuatu beat them 3-2 but there is a silver lining for coach Frank Farina. Despite missing out on a semi final spot in this tournament on goal difference to Solomon Islands they did have a better goal difference than Vanuatu and, as the third place team, move on to round 3 of World Cup qualifying. The dream of redemption for Farina is still alive.
In today's other match New Zealand scored an 80th minute goal to beat Solomon Islands 1-0. If New Zealand do indeed make it to Russia it will be amusing to think that while they could be giving teams like Germany and Brazil a hard time, 2 years previously they struggled to beat Solomon Islands.
Oh Frank! Fiji lost their final group stage match in the OFC Nations Cup. Vanuatu beat them 3-2 but there is a silver lining for coach Frank Farina. Despite missing out on a semi final spot in this tournament on goal difference to Solomon Islands they did have a better goal difference than Vanuatu and, as the third place team, move on to round 3 of World Cup qualifying. The dream of redemption for Farina is still alive.
In today's other match New Zealand scored an 80th minute goal to beat Solomon Islands 1-0. If New Zealand do indeed make it to Russia it will be amusing to think that while they could be giving teams like Germany and Brazil a hard time, 2 years previously they struggled to beat Solomon Islands.
Friday, 3 June 2016
OFC, Copa snippets
Day -740. WorldCup2018
Early Saturday morning , barring any huge upsets, Fiji and New Zealand will have qualified for the semifinals of the OFC Nations Cup. And on Sunday hosts PNG will be hoping that New Caledonia and Tahiti don't draw, thus ensuring they move on with a win against Samoa.
Across the world, Colombia opened the Copa America Centenario with a 2-0 win over the hosts, USA.
And next Friday the Euros will start. It's almost better than having a World Cup. Three separate tournaments happening simultaneously.
In other news, Fifa's newest country, but not the UN's,Kosovo, played their first official match, a friendly 2-0 win against the Faroe Islands.
Early Saturday morning , barring any huge upsets, Fiji and New Zealand will have qualified for the semifinals of the OFC Nations Cup. And on Sunday hosts PNG will be hoping that New Caledonia and Tahiti don't draw, thus ensuring they move on with a win against Samoa.
Across the world, Colombia opened the Copa America Centenario with a 2-0 win over the hosts, USA.
And next Friday the Euros will start. It's almost better than having a World Cup. Three separate tournaments happening simultaneously.
In other news, Fifa's newest country, but not the UN's,Kosovo, played their first official match, a friendly 2-0 win against the Faroe Islands.
Thursday, 2 June 2016
OFC Nations Cup
Day -741 WorldCup2018.
The Copa America, the Euros and the OFC Nations Cup. All happening this summer. The Copa starts on Friday and the Euros next week. The OFC Nations Cup has been going on for a week. The Copa is unique in that it is a special 100 year anniversary edition and has 6 non-South American guest countries taking part. The OFC Nations Cup is the Oceania championship and it's uniqueness is that it is also round 2 of World Cup qualifying.
This is where I admit that with all the things I follow and write about I did know about this but did not remember when I mentioned round 2 of qualifying last week. The other thing about the OFC is that while the world will hear about the Copa and the Euros (because the world cannot go without football for a couple of months) nobody outside the Oceania region will know much about it.
It's in Papua New Guinea and the 8 competing teams are the 8 out of the 11 countries that made it to the second round of World Cup qualifying. The top two teams in each group of 4 move on to the semi finals and the winning team represents Oceania in the 2017 Confederations Cup. The only team other than Australia and New Zealand to win this was Tahiti, last time round. And that's why they were in the last Confederations Cup in Brazil when we all were in awe of the romanticism of the small Pacific nation being thrashed by everybody. Now that Australia are Asian , it really takes New Zealand to be in a trance for them not to win it. They have started off with 2 wins this time and will be determined to not be upstaged and embarrassed by Tahiti or Fiji this time.
The top three teams in each group become the 6 teams who will move on to Round 3 and compete for the one half spot for Russia 2018. A half spot because they will have to win the inter-continental play-off.
Stay tuned here for updates and results from PNG.
The Copa America, the Euros and the OFC Nations Cup. All happening this summer. The Copa starts on Friday and the Euros next week. The OFC Nations Cup has been going on for a week. The Copa is unique in that it is a special 100 year anniversary edition and has 6 non-South American guest countries taking part. The OFC Nations Cup is the Oceania championship and it's uniqueness is that it is also round 2 of World Cup qualifying.
This is where I admit that with all the things I follow and write about I did know about this but did not remember when I mentioned round 2 of qualifying last week. The other thing about the OFC is that while the world will hear about the Copa and the Euros (because the world cannot go without football for a couple of months) nobody outside the Oceania region will know much about it.
It's in Papua New Guinea and the 8 competing teams are the 8 out of the 11 countries that made it to the second round of World Cup qualifying. The top two teams in each group of 4 move on to the semi finals and the winning team represents Oceania in the 2017 Confederations Cup. The only team other than Australia and New Zealand to win this was Tahiti, last time round. And that's why they were in the last Confederations Cup in Brazil when we all were in awe of the romanticism of the small Pacific nation being thrashed by everybody. Now that Australia are Asian , it really takes New Zealand to be in a trance for them not to win it. They have started off with 2 wins this time and will be determined to not be upstaged and embarrassed by Tahiti or Fiji this time.
The top three teams in each group become the 6 teams who will move on to Round 3 and compete for the one half spot for Russia 2018. A half spot because they will have to win the inter-continental play-off.
Stay tuned here for updates and results from PNG.
Wednesday, 1 June 2016
Filler day
Day -742. WorldCup2018
The world cup qualifying going on now in Oceania is also the OFC Nations Cup. Two for one. More tomorrow.
The world cup qualifying going on now in Oceania is also the OFC Nations Cup. Two for one. More tomorrow.
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