Qualifying confusion after controversial rule change by FIFA.

September 30, 2009

There was some confusion today after FIFA President confirmed that the play-off draw for the European qualifying groups will involve teams being seeded.

Blatter was allegedly quoted after a meeting in Rio de Janeiro as saying “We have decided on seeding the teams into two groups of four, taking the FIFA rankings into account, with the top four in one pot and the others in another pot”

The move has brought widespread condemnation and accusations of favouritism towards the bigger nations.

Perhaps Mr Blatter and co were worried that World Cup regulars like Germany, France and Portugal might not qualify and therefore reduce the amount of likely revenue when the tournament commences next June.

If the move is true, it seems startling that an organisation like FIFA that goes under such banners as “Fair Play” and “The Beautiful Game” would use such incredibly one sided tactics.

Bearing in mind that the current format for qualifying from Europe already favours the bigger countries, it does appear that some are now getting a second bite of the cherry.

It had been previously assumed that all of the second place teams that had qualified for the play-offs would be put into an open draw with the resulting ties being played over two legs, home and away.

If we use the example of Portugal, who were originally given the advantage of being the top seed in Group One alongside Denmark, Sweden, Hungary, Albania and Malta.

On paper, most people would say that Portugal and either Denmark or Sweden would finish first and second in that group.

Portugal however, have had a tricky campaign and currently lie in third place, which means they need to get results from their final two games to be assured of at least a second place finish and thus, qualifying for the play-off spot.

They would then enter into the draw as one of the top seeded teams and mean they would get one of the lesser ranked nations, giving them yet again, a sizeable advantage.

Whereas Portugal may have underperformed, Ireland, in contrast, seem to have done quite the opposite and left themselves with an almost guaranteed second place finish by grounding out results that possibly weren’t expected.

All the hard work could come to nothing however as they will more than likely face France, Germany, Greece or the aforementioned Portugal in the play-off spot which on paper at least, puts the Irish at a serious disadvantage.

There is no official statement on the FIFA.com website to confirm this alteration to the process so it will be interesting to see if this is official news or just internet rumours.

If these rumours are confirmed, it could turn out to be one nip/tuck too far as FIFA attempts to carry out some plastic surgery in a bid to hide the cracks of an ageing organisation’s efforts to display The Beautiful Game, in all its’ glory……by any means necessary.

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