2022 FIFA World Cup - Qatar

[jayakris]

One way to change the rankings faster is to have a recency premium. This way the older results are valued less.

So, the option is either to play more matches or change the system to make it exponentially decay much faster. For example, consider one win as two wins this year and one win as one win if it was last year. I am simplifying to show the idea, not the exact proposed system.

Maybe there is no need for that quick a decay as in an exponential function (though a half-life of 2 years is probably okay). But a recency premium is absolutely needed. It is crazy that they did not take it seriously when the ranking system was changed. The earlier system had it (100% for current year, 75% last year, 50% and 25%, iirc). That was somewhat reasonable. So it was not an unknown issue, so I am sure they considered it. Just took it as not serious, while it was clear to some of us (and I think we had discussed it) that the new system would have this problem.

[sameerph]

But why are crying so much about rankings here? Haven't the matches and draw gone pretty much as per rankings in this world Cup?

[jayakris]

Yeah, rankings are okay at the higher levels where the team quality does not change that drastically in 4 years. Just that the lower level rankings are all screwed up, and India is over-ranked now. Not sure if I should complain though

[jayakris]

Holy Mother of Marrakesh!! Spain is out and Morocco advances!!!!

What an amazing defensive display by Morocco. I have never enjoyed watching defense as much as I did today. Spain was not trying to create chances much (and played with the European arrogance that the others would make mistakes and let their goals in), but whatever small openings they got were closed by the Morocco defense so fast. It was sublime.

They have not allowed a goal by the opponents in 4 matches (CRO, BEL, CAN, ESP) and 390+ minutes so far. Actually 450 minutes, and 7.5 hours of football. And then they did not let in a goal even in a penalty shootout, the goalie saving two of them!!! How rare is that? They must be cursing themselves for letting in an own goal against Canada (and they tried their best to do another OG today too, haha)

The greatest defensive side ever? I don't know, but I have never seen anybody play defense like these guys.

[jayakris]

I find that since USA beat Morocco 3-0 at Cincinnati in early June, and RSA scored one goal on them a couple of weeks later, this Moroccan side had gone EIGHT friggin matches without letting a goal in. Liberia, Chile, Paraguay, Georgia, Croatia, Belgium, Canada and Spain have all been unsuccessful in scoring a goal against them. Jesus Christ!

[srini]

Haven't the matches and draw gone pretty much as per rankings in this world Cup?

If being in Top 16 and not making it to round of 16 can be considered as matches not going per rankings, then #2 Belgium, #10 Denmark,#11 Germany, #13 Mexico, #14 Uruguay and #16 USA didn't make it to R16. #6 Italy didn't even qualify to play in Qatar.

But i am not so much concerned about outcomes of the matches per ranking but about the frequency of matches played in a year and the toll it takes on lower ranked sides. I think the disposition of FIFA is geared more towards Football leagues (most of which are played in Europe) rather than making more international matches happen. Actually i feel some of the clubs can go on and beat some of the elite nations if ever such thing takes place.

More than the responsiveness to match outcomes, i think, a right ranking system should probably penalize nations for not playing enough international matches by hurting their chances of getting qualified in their respective continental qualifiers. Current rate of only 10-12 matches for a nation in a year is just ridiculous. FIFA can continue to hang on with current system but only at the expense of the world's 2 largest populated nations not being engaged in it sport. Choice is theirs!

[jayakris]

^^^ Hey, #16 USA did make it into the final-16. But USA was probably under-ranked, and should have been in the top-12 or so.

If you look at it another way, 8 of the current top-10 made the final-16, so that is not so bad. But only 5 of the top 8 will be in the QFs, as #2, #6 and #7 won't be. Still not unacceptably poor ranking near the top.

The teams who made final-16 but were ranked outside were: #18 Senegal, #22 Morocco, #24 Japan, #26 Poland, #28 S.Korea, #38 Australia. African and Asia-Oceania teams were under-ranked.

[srini]

^^^^ Sorry, since US exited too early in R16 (the 1st exit from R16) that i got carried away with thinking it didn't make out of group. The thumping it got and the disappointment didn't help either

By the way, Portugal looked pretty ordinary until yesterday (actually got defeated by S Korea) but suddenly this freak Ramos makes it look out of world!Just when an African nation makes it to QF without allowing any goals, things start shaping up this way!! Stars are not yet aligned for any Asian or African nation in Final.

[jayakris]

^^^ Nah, I think Portugal will find out that Morocco knows defense. It will be like nothing Portugal expects. They may end up not possessing the ball as much as Spain did, and so could concede some goals to Morocco too. I am rooting for a Morocco upset and an African nation making the semifinal for the first time.

[srini]

^^^ Nah, I think Portugal will find out that Morocco knows defense. It will be like nothing Portugal expects. They may end up not possessing the ball as much as Spain did, and so could concede some goals to Morocco too. I am rooting for a Morocco upset and an African nation making the semifinal for the first time.

Super Like.

Miss the 'Like' post option on this Forum! Can we make a request to Dhruv to upgrade the interface to allow "Liking a post" ? Don't get me wrong, i m not one of those slick Meta or Insta users. I hardly login FB and don't have Insta. But i feel sometimes we may not need to reply just to let other users know that we liked some post.

[PKBasu]

From my Facebook page (posted a few minutes after Morocco pulled it off):

Finally, a European team is upset in a World Cup knockout game by...an Arab (North African) side, Morocco. Yassine Bounou in goal proved the immovable object: they couldn’t pass him in 120 minutes of action, and they couldn’t get a shot past him in the penalty shoot-out either: 3 shots saved by Bono, with facile nonchalance. There is a delicious irony in the fact that Bounou plies his trade at Seville, the city that was at the heart of Moorish Spain (conquered by the Moors in 712, and the capital of the Almoravid and Almohad kingdoms in al-Andalus, which were both Berber-dominated and hence decidedly Moroccan).

So there were 1300 years of history on the line in this match, apart from the football (probably felt less by the Spanish than the Moroccan players). Moroccan troops (mainly Berber) were in the vanguard of the Umayyad invasion of Spain in 711, and the Arabs and Berbers ruled most of Spain for the next 400 years, and southern Spain all the way until 1492, the year that Columbus’s journey to the Americas was partly funded by Isabella and Ferdinand’s loot from the reconquest of Granada. Spain and Morocco have continued to have tense relations in the centuries since; there are still a couple of Spanish enclaves on the Moroccan mainland, Gibraltar was the last Moroccan bastion in Spain until it fell to the British. Seville, itself, was the first of the great Moorish cities to fall to Christian Castile in 1248. The Inquisition rooted out all the Muslims and Jews from Spain, but football has the been the basis of a quiet, minuscule repopulation of Spain by Moroccans. Achraf Hakimi, who scored the final penalty for Morocco, was born and brought up in Madrid to Moroccan parents.

[SaniaFan]

Croatia wins the QF against Brazil!! 4-2 on PS

[Rajiv]

1 shot at the goal compared to 11 by the Brazilian's and how important that 1 shot was.

Croatia kept the ball tightly not allowing any break-in and kept the play confined to midfield.

But it was the penalties which mattered, and how skillfully they did it, many of them were hitting the side net , not the back net.

[jayakris]

Well, the Croatian goal keeper was having the game of his life. Somehow he was always at the right place and had a body part stopping the Brazil shots. The Brazilians seemed to pick the worst angles to kick the ball in. So sad to see that they are out. Once Brazil isn't there, the world cup simply loses a lot of flair. Mbappe and the old man from Argentina are still there... The old man from Portugal too, though he may not get to play much now!

[jayakris]

The old man from Argentina survives to live another day. Messi still has some magic every now and then though. The assist on their first goal was beautiful. But what a terrific (and furious) comeback by the Dutch after 83 minutes to score 2 goals and even it! So much drama. Yet another shootout, and the blue moved on.