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Expanding beyond 16 finalists for EURO Finals; Alternative proposal for expansion
Topic Started: Jul 7 2008, 06:28 PM (319 Views)
NeverMissPens
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It seems that UEFA is intent on expanding the national championship finals beyond sixteen finalists. The mooted expansion would have 24 teams in the final. 24 is a bad number, it allows teams that finish 3rd out of 4 to qualify (in 6 groups of 4), or creates too many group games (in groups of six), or too few (in groups of 3). I propose that hte answer (given that expansion will happen) is to have 20 teams in the finals, this would also improve qualification, here's how:

The 20 teams in the finals would be in 4 groups of 5, top 2 provide 8 teams for the Quarter Finals just like now.

How to get to 20 teams and make the qualifiers truly dramatic? Put the top 40 teams (on performance basis) in 10 qualifying groups, have the other 13 teams play off (so the messy part is confined to the lowest stage) for TEN additional places and they go into the 10 groups, Now top two of 5 from each qualify for the finals. Tightens up the qualifiers, less club v country conflict AND deals with expansion without ruining the competition.

The beauty of this system is that seeding would be much more balanced in the qualifiers, and consequently also in the finals, but more importantly, it would keep the event slim and relevant throughout.

If we don't campaign for something smarter, EUFA will drag us in 24.
Thoughts?


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Manzanares
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An interesting idea you've proposed. I would prefer maintaining the current level of 16. We've just finished a wonderful tournament, perhaps the best Euro in recent memory. Don't fix what is not broken. I know expansion= more money but it would dilute the tournament. NeverMissPens' proposal (and welcome to the message board by the way, with a screen name like your's you must be German! :D ) of 20 teams would be far preferable to expanding to 24 teams and having 3rd place teams qualify for the next round. I also like the proposal to limit qualifying by having Europe's lowest seeded teams playoff against one another. So bottom line for me is, keep it as is but if expansion is inevitable, the proposal by NeverMissPens is much preferable to Mssr. Platini's.
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Dr. Z
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Great idea NeverMissPens! I like the idea of having the weaker teams playoff against one another, as UEFA does with it's club competitions and like what CONCACAF and Africa do in World Cup qualifying. So why not do it in Europe too? What business does Faroe Islands have playing Germany and getting beat by 7-8 goals? Let them play Andorra first, a team they have a chance to actually beat, and earn the right to play Germany or Spain.

Like manzanares, I would prefer keeping the status quo but if it is to expand, the proposal by our new poster makes way more sense than UEFA's.

Welcome to the forum NeverMissPens.
Poniendo el pecho a las balas!
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Merengue
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Let me add my welcome too for NeverMissPens and an interesting discussion has been raised. Like Manzanares and Dr. Z I too would prefer to keep the current format. It works, and it gives the two finalists 6 games yet is able to be completed within a 3 week time span, one week shorter than the World Cup. I don't want to see the Euro championship diluted with less worthy teams invited. Europe does not have more than 16 teams deserving to be in a national team finals. Adding more would only weaken the competition.

I know there is a push to expand but a larger tournament will also mean that less countries will be able to host the competition. A 24 team tournament may only be able to be completed if it is played in Spain, Italy, France, Germany and England. Not many more nations would eb able to handle such a large competition. And UEFA's trend ahs been to pass this tournament on to smaller nations, thsoe less likely to ever host a World Cup. That is, I think not only a reasonable goal but an equitable one too.

Maybe the fact this most recent tournament was such a success will convince those in power (other than Platini who is starting to rival Joseph Blatter in the number of bird brained ideas he comes up with!) that the format should not be tinkered with.
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libero
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I agree that Platini is starting to become like Sepp Blatter with his silly proposals. And expanding the European Championships is just that. More games equals more gate receipts but would TV rights actually go up with a 24 team competition? That also would take away most of the drama from the qualifying comeptition. You would have to be really bad not to make a 24 team tournament from your confederation!

I hope this proposal falls flat on it's face like Platini's previous one to reduce the Champions League participants from each country.
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Don Balon
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I am another one against expanding the tournament for all the reasons others have already cited here. If the competition was to expand NeverMissesPens proposal makes more sense than what we've seen from UEFA.
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historyman
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A ludicrous proposal from Platini and UEFA. We've just had one of the best tournaments in living memory and this announcement has left a sour taste in the mouth.

If 24 teams is to be the way forward, the Spain '82 model might be worth pursuing. Only the top two from each group qualify, then four groups of three in the next phase, with the winners qualifying for the semi-finals.

The finalists would still play the same number of matches as they would under the knockout rounds system. With only three teams in the second round groups, would the onus not be on teams to win their matches?

And any format which produced the immortal Italy v Brazil clash of '82 has to be considered.
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NeverMissPens
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It may be that the 24 will be adopted and 6 groups of 4 will go into 4 of 3. This format though has a much higher probability of throwing up horror shows, like Poland playing out a 0-0 v USSR in same '82 WC, and tied points totals. Largely considered inferior to having more knock-out stages, but at least balanced
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1982_FIFA_World_Cup#Group_A
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Simon
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Euro 2008 was enjoyable on the whole but we shouldn't forget some of its important weaknesses. The group stage was damaged by the presence of some very poor teams - Switzerland, Austria, Poland and Greece were truly terrible and we should remember that they account for a quarter of the finalists. Then we have Czech Republic, Sweden, France and Romania who looked at various times too old, too limited and far too negative. None of these teams really contributed anything much to the tournament and by now we've accounted for half of the teams there!

Even among the quarter-finalists, teams like Croatia, Russia, Italy and Holland only managed to play well once or twice. Everyone knew how weak Germany were, but equally we all knew they'd make it to the final regardless. Based on all this, we could almost imagine UEFA's response would be to lower the number of teams at the finals! No, I agree with what's already been said - 16 teams is about right. In my view, Euro 2000 is the best tournament of recent times and provides the best case for a 16-team finals. Like Spain this year, France were excellent champions but unlike Spain they had to play a very strong team (Italy) in a dramatic final. But in general there were more teams who fully justified their presence and brought their 'A-game' to the tournament - Holland were great (never more so than when beating France and putting six past a strong Yugoslavia), as were Portugal, Turkey, Spain, Romania, the Yugoslavs themselves etc. There were plenty of great games (Yugoslavia 3-3 Slovenia, Yugoslavia 3-4 Spain, Portugal 3-2 England, Holland 3-2 France, Romania 3-2 England, Holland 6-1 Yugoslavia, Spain 1-2 France, Portugal 1-2 France etc plus the final) and in amongst all the excellent individual performances from Kluivert, Henry, Milosevic, Figo, Rui Costa, Vieira etc we had Zidane who was utterly out of this world. 16 teams is fine, any more dilutes it.

Finally, IMO the more straight knockout football you have the better rather than extra group football which too often produces irrelevant dead rubbers. I see the logic in NeverMissPens ideas re qualifying but I personally don't like the idea of eliminating some teams in pre-qualifiers. Fans from smaller nations don't get to see their clubs in the final stages of the CL, so their one opportunity to see top class players and teams comes in international football and I don't think we should deprive them of that. Plus, teams improve greatly by playing plenty of competitive football against the top nations. England had two 8-0 wins over Turkey in the late 1980s, but look at Turkish football now. Even Holland were whipping boys in the 1960s. Besides, only 2 or 3 European countries such as San Marino and Andorra are genuinely uncompetitive. In recent times we've seen Liechtenstein and Armenia draw with Portugal, Lithuania draw with world champions Italy, Holland winning by just one goal each time in their four matches with Albania and Luxembourg, Faroes losing 2-1 to Italy, Cyprus drawing with Germany, Malta and Moldova drawing with Turkey, while Ireland needed a late goal to beat San Marino 2-1 and Russia won just 1-0 in Andorra in their crucial last qualifier. IMO, we should leave well alone.
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raconteur
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Include me with those against expanding the tournament but if it were to be expanded I like NMP's idea (sorry I had to abbreviate our new poster's screen name!). I see Simon's reasoning that the Liechtenstein's and San Marino's should have the chance to play against Europe's powers but as another poster wrote, wouldn't it be better to first give them the chance to play a game they have an opportunity to win against a team like Faroe Islands, before moving on to play Italy or France? I don't think NMP's proposal would mean teams like Armenia or Lithuania would be playing preliminary round matches before the group stage but the real minnows of Europe, San Marino, Liechtenstein, Faroe Islands, Andorra, etc. should. Africa and CONCACAF do it that way and their qualifying tournaments seem to work well.

And absolutely count me against the idea of a second stage of group games if the Euro tournament was to expand. There is a reason the Champions League also dropped that idea.
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NeverMissPens
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Raconteur deals with the small nation issue succinctly. I will add three things:
1. The 'small nation' pre-qualifying could be exciting in of itself (say split into 3 groups) and would allow for odd numbers of nations as Europe's borders morph and nations get banned.
2. Ten of these nations would still go on to play the 'big' nations in the main qualifying.
3. Keeping things as are increases tensions between commercial club sides and international football. with groups of 7 (12 games) with possibly 2 very small, or weak nations playing a major football nation. I have little sympathy for big corporate clubs, but top players having to turn out 4 times with stressed bodies, in relatively meaningless games, isn't sensible. Groups of 5 with one minnow is better.
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raconteur
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NeverMissPens,Jul 10 2008
10:50 AM
Raconteur deals with the small nation issue succinctly. I will add three things:
1. The 'small nation' pre-qualifying could be exciting in of itself (say split into 3 groups) and would allow for odd numbers of nations as Europe's borders morph and nations get banned.
2. Ten of these nations would still go on to play the 'big' nations in the main qualifying.
3. Keeping things as are increases tensions between commercial club sides and international football. with groups of 7 (12 games) with possibly 2 very small, or weak nations playing a major football nation. I have little sympathy for big corporate clubs, but top players having to turn out 4 times with stressed bodies, in relatively meaningless games, isn't sensible. Groups of 5 with one minnow is better.

Good points, I also come back to the point made earlier, why is it good for UEFA to do this with it's club competitions (playing preliminary games among the weaker nations) but not with the national teams? And these prelim games seem to work in other confederations so why not attempt it in Europe.

But after saying all of this, I still prefer that the European championships remain at 16 teams!
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Winslow
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The Rugby World Cup uses 20 teams (four groups of five), and one thing to be said for it is that every team gets a bye date to rest up while its group opponents play each other. Of course, that's useless for the teams that have byes at the very beginning or the very end of group play, but the lowest seeds can be those teams (if you jigger it right).

24 teams is too many--every other team would qualify, just like the NBA playoffs. But money is the only reason to go beyond 16.

I applaud NMP's instinct to shorten qualifying. Many people have asked if the Euro minnows ought to go through a play-in round before real qualifying starts. I still prefer more, smaller groups (say, 13 groups of 4 for the next WC) where only group winners go to the finals. Second place should mean nothing! B)
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