[Anomander Rake]

The Turks are nowhere near to Spain qualitywise. Same about all the other groups. One can only "choke" not to qualify.

But this even more true for the vast gulf in quality (on paper, mind you) between Argentina, Brazil and everyone else in South America/ You cannot really believe that the difference in quality (on paper) between Germany and Russia, England and Croatia, Sweden and Portugal is bigger than that of Brazil and Paraguay?

 

[Talus]

Cuz with that type of Talent, and with the Arch Rivals, Not Qualifying is worse than a Disaster.

I m talking about both teams.

But there's no chance that those two teams would not qualify. Both Argentina and Brazil are in the top 3, so to me it looks pretty good.

You don't need to piss over all the other nations to get into the world cup.

It's like like how you can simply finish 4th in your league (Liverpool in 2004) and then go on to win the CL.

 

[Rhizoid]

"If the qualifiers ended today, we'd be qualified for the World Cup!" - Elano after the 0-0 with Colombia.

Quote of the day. :howler:

 

[Andy Christ]

I honestly don't understand why Brazil and Argentina fans are making such a fuss here. The quanification tournament itself is useless because the point of it is to get into the World Cup there's no way that those two teams will not qualify in the end. The South American qualifying is not as volatile as the European one because all the countries are in the same "group" so you can afford to be bad and still get through.

Back in 2002 Brazil barely made it to the World Cup, yet dominated everyone in the tournament. Argentina dominated everyone in the qualifications and yet failed to do anything at the Cup. That just shows that this tournament isn't very useful to access how good a team is.

agreed

SA qualification campaign is just a formality for Brazil and Argentina. It would be much more difficult for them to qualify in Europe where when you choke you're most likely out (or at least have to suffer through the nerve-wrecking playoff).

 

[Rhizoid]

You can not possibly be serious. This has got to be one of the dumbest things I ever read. :howler:

Why don't you think so?

The format itself, is the toughest. If it were split into two groups, with "seeds" like Argentina and Brazil "leading" each one; then it'd be more simple.

Plus the altitude factor for games in Colombia, Bolivia, and Peru...the S. American qualifiers are by no means easy. (which I'm sure that's not what you're saying, you're just disagreeing with the fact that it's the most difficult...)

 

[Nerazzurri4life]

Personally I enjoy the SA qualifiers the most. The matches are so intense, rapid and crazy. The timing's excellent for a part time working bum like me, too.

 

[Capitan Totti]

Lemme explain ******.

Totti haz neva played in La Paz puffin thin air like weed and he neva had to travel a whole continent durin 2 dayz in orda to choke wid Italy.
Uttawize hed've failed miserably like he haz alwayz dun playin fo Italy aite ?

I am not a ******, and that was rubbish... AS your posts usually are.

Since you usually post the dumbest things, I'll take this as a compliment...

South American qualifers have a couple of things the European qualifiers dont:
2 extra days of travel JUST to get to the right place (including there and back)- this means more fatigue, and less time to train, since most player are running the leagues in Europe
3 locations with different altitude 3 games out of 18
2 WC winning teams to face 4 out of the 18 rounds, and 2 teams that probably will make it into the round of 16 (uruguay/paraguay) thats 4 out of 10 rounds of tough matches. That means that half of the games you have to be vigillant.
So the final math is: 11 games where any team in the world can win or lose out of 18... It's not that easy.

I am gonna avoid the first part because you clearly show a ridiculous bias against me that is founded on nothing but idiotic rumors made up by sore losers. Let me just state that all of your excuses like altitude don't mean jack when you compare the quality of the teams. The main two powerhouses in SA are Brazil and Argentina, if you gonna pick excuses on altitude and what not... get a clue son. I am not saying they are easy, I am just saying that they are not the toughest. It is always the same teams, and its usually the same teams who qualify.

Why don't you think so?

The format itself, is the toughest. If it were split into two groups, with "seeds" like Argentina and Brazil "leading" each one; then it'd be more simple.

Plus the altitude factor for games in Colombia, Bolivia, and Peru...the S. American qualifiers are by no means easy. (which I'm sure that's not what you're saying, you're just disagreeing with the fact that it's the most difficult...)

Read above. I am not saying that they are easy, but come on... this altitude excuse was mocked when the USA used it when playing in Mexico, saying that it means little... but now it counts? I don't think so. You are not playing on the K2 guys. :rollani:

 

[M.G.]

This is like one of those Serie A vs EPL threads except not as tired.

I agree that South American qualifiers are the most difficult. What is amazing is that they get 4 1/2 WC spots while CONCACAF gets 3 1/2. I'm not complaining but Costa Rica and T&T qould get whupped from most teams in S. America 4/5 times. Mexico and USA would probably struggle to qualify.Thank goodness, we have Uncle Jack on our side eh?

They really have to come up with some way for teams to qualify against teams form other confederations, while taking into consideration the fatc that they have to travel halfway across the world to play. If they can do that, then we can realy see the world's best teams at the WC.

 

[Talus]

The SA qualifying might be tougher for the mid-level teams compared to the UEFA WCQ, but the South American Big-2 (Brazil, Argentina) has it easier than the European top teams.

Brazil and Argentina only need to finish top 4 of their WCQ, whereas Germany and Italy must WIN their group. Not finishing in the first place for the UEFA WCQ means that you risk playing a knockout game which anything goes.

Another factor is that in the UEFA WCQ, the fact that there's many more teams means that there is a random factor to drawing the group stages. For example, for the UEFA WCQ, it was possible to have a group like Spain-England-Ukraine, which is harder than a hypothetical Italy-Israel-Finland group. In SA, you can't get screwed over by getting a an usually hard group because everyone plays in one group.

Therefore, the UEFA qualification is also more random and so there's a chance of big teams going out due to that randomness.

If this Argentina team were a really strong one and they were simply losing matches in the qualification due to laziness of players, I wouldn't really mind that much if I were an Argentina fan. However, I think a realistic issue is that this Argentina team isn't that strong on paper as it could be, partly because new talents have not been properly developed by the coach. But Brazil has no issues in this department.

 

[Capitan Totti]

You just got to love Talus man.... he is such a good poster. :thumbsup: