World Cup Time for pre-qualifying in the Women's game?

[werthersoriginal]

At the beginning of the modern game in the late 19th century, with the Royal Engineers et al, you got some higher scores than are usual today. This will happen less if the women’s game gets more established worldwide.

 

[38yearsofpain]

How can you enjoy a GK not being able to kick the ball beyond the 18 yard box from a goal kick?? For anyone that doesn't know what i'm on about, check out England's 18th goal last night.

It isn't a knuckle dragging opinion, it is a decision based upon what you can be seen before our very eyes! Look at the scores in the women's game last night for an idea of the 'quality' on offer:

England 20 Latvia 0
Ireland 11 Georgia 0
Luxemborg 0 Austria 8
Spain 8 Scotland 0

If you choose to watch and enjoy the kind of spectacle that is on offer, then good for you. No problems with that. However, please do not be that guy that decides that anyone who chooses to question the 'product' and decides to not tune in to 20-0 stuffing's must have 'knuckle dragging opinions'.

Someone else mentioned the 10,000+ crowd. For balance, these were the ticket prices for last night's game:

£15.00 – Category 1 (Full Price Adult)
£5.00 – Concessions (Over 60's & 18-24)
£2.50 – Child (Under 16s)

For group bookings of 9 or more, please use the Group tab when booking tickets. Group prices:
£7.50 – Category 1 (Full Price Adult)
£5.00 – Concessions (Over 60's & 18-24)
£2.50 – Child (Under 16s)

There is plenty of peddling of the women's game in the media and on various social platforms, not sure it is needed here too.

There are a hundred times more peddling of the men's game in the media.

The women's game is several years behind the development of the mens game. As a for instance there are only 200 women players in Latvia and many players couldn't get time off work to play so they were severely weakened. When the men's game was at a similar stage of development there was no such international structure. So England would never have played Latvia if it had existed so the ridiculous never occured. The women's game will develop very much quicker indeed if the FA hadn't banned women's football from playing in league grounds back in the 1920's when over 50, 000 attended a match in St Helens this debate would be irrelevant.
It is just another result of historical sexual discrimination.

 

[Ewes]

I like women’s football and think the future of the game is strong and should be supported. I’ve set up a girls football team for Under 7s which is now flourishing.

But for a little balance - recently I refereed an official friendly game where a Home Nations (not English) full/senior international ladies team played the Under 15 boys academy team of a current League 2 club. The game wasn’t close - the international ladies team were well beaten.

 

[tonyw]

Honestly, I think the solution is pretty obvious, and the same for both men's and women's games.

Assuming UEFA wants to keep approximately the same format then you should have 10 groups of 4 teams.

So the Top 25 European teams - according to the rankings from the previous Nations League - automatically go into the group stage.
And the remaining 30 play a head-to-head home-and-away first round qualifier to join them (again, seeded based on Nations League performance)

It's exactly what Africa and Asia do. Everyone still has a chance, but you take the very worst teams out of the group stage to avoid this sort of pointless mismatch. Fewer games for all national sides would also make scheduling easier and ease some workloads as well.

 

[38yearsofpain]

Honestly, I think the solution is pretty obvious, and the same for both men's and women's games.

Assuming UEFA wants to keep approximately the same format then you should have 10 groups of 4 teams.

So the Top 25 European teams - according to the rankings from the previous Nations League - automatically go into the group stage.
And the remaining 30 play a head-to-head home-and-away first round qualifier to join them (again, seeded based on Nations League performance)

It's exactly what Africa and Asia do. Everyone still has a chance, but you take the very worst teams out of the group stage to avoid this sort of pointless mismatch. Fewer games for all national sides would also make scheduling easier and ease some workloads as well.

Totally agree but it will never happen, more games equals more revenue for UEFA and FIFA. They are not interested in fair competition only revenue generation.

 

[werthersoriginal]

I like women’s football and think the future of the game is strong and should be supported. I’ve set up a girls football team for Under 7s which is now flourishing.

But for a little balance - recently I refereed an official friendly game where a Home Nations (not English) full/senior international ladies team played the Under 15 boys academy team of a current League 2 club. The game wasn’t close - the international ladies team were well beaten.

But this isn’t relevant to anything- men and women have their own competitions. Thankfully you no longer hear people muttering that men would beat top female tennis players, though I remember it in the 70s.

 

[holdsteady]

There are a hundred times more peddling of the men's game in the media.

The women's game is several years behind the development of the mens game. As a for instance there are only 200 women players in Latvia and many players couldn't get time off work to play so they were severely weakened. When the men's game was at a similar stage of development there was no such international structure. So England would never have played Latvia if it had existed so the ridiculous never occured. The women's game will develop very much quicker indeed if the FA hadn't banned women's football from playing in league grounds back in the 1920's when over 50, 000 attended a match in St Helens this debate would be irrelevant.
It is just another result of historical sexual discrimination.

Are there actually only 200 female registered players in Latvia? There used to be 7 divisions of 11/12 teams in the Morrells Oxford Sunday league twenty years ago, that means there were (at least) 4 times as many players. Ridiculous to put such small player pools into international competitions.

 

[bazzer9461]

Are there actually only 200 female registered players in Latvia? There used to be 7 divisions of 11/12 teams in the Morrells Oxford Sunday league twenty years ago, that means there were (at least) 4 times as many players. Ridiculous to put such small player pools into international competitions.

But tbf fare play to Latvia for entering, but it certainly needs to be looked into if a lot of the minnow teams are losing by big score lines in ladies football. Maybe a competition for the minnow sides with maybe the semi finalists being allowed to enter the World Cup.

 

[IsleofWightYellow]

But this isn’t relevant to anything- men and women have their own competitions. Thankfully you no longer hear people muttering that men would beat top female tennis players, though I remember it in the 70s.

I agree, and that’s ridiculous to compare the two, but watching Emma Raducanu win recently you didn’t care if she’d beat Andy Murray or not, you just saw brilliant, exciting tennis. However, if she played a Latvian part timer who didn’t win a single point, double faulted every time and couldn’t even hit a single shot back (equivalent to the Latvian female goalkeeper not being able to take a goal kick) it would be pretty pointless.

 

[Essexyellows]

Armenia 0 - 10 Norway

And Sunderland are losing 0- 1 as well........

 

[Eaststanding]

The condescending comments about ‘pointless mismatches’ and countries who shouldn’t be
’allowed’ to enter the World Cup just smacks of sneery elitism.
Why shouldn’t any country of any size or footballing ability have the opportunity to challenge themselves against the worlds best teams in some of the finest stadiums in the world? When I was kid i always looked forward to playing representative games at The Manor or Elm Park, Reading. If we got battered, we learnt from it and moved on. It’s the stuff of dreams for some players and long may that continue.

 

[tonyw]

Totally agree but it will never happen, more games equals more revenue for UEFA and FIFA. They are not interested in fair competition only revenue generation.

To be fair, I don't think it's FIFA. They haven't imposed any restrictions on the other confederations.

So, for example in Asia, Timor-Leste's World Cup qualifying consisted of them losing 5-1 and 7-1 to Malaysia and that was that.
In Africa, the Seychelles got battered 10-0 on aggregate by Rwanda, and then exited stage left.

I think it's just UEFA that want to maximize the number of games that everyone is playing - even if a large number of them are not competitive in the least.

 

[Sarge]

pre qualifying would make sense for 'emerging' nations ( male and female)

then perhaps seeding?

 

[tonyw]

The condescending comments about ‘pointless mismatches’ and countries who shouldn’t be
’allowed’ to enter the World Cup just smacks of sneery elitism.
Why shouldn’t any country of any size or footballing ability have the opportunity to challenge themselves against the worlds best teams in some of the finest stadiums in the world? When I was kid i always looked forward to playing representative games at The Manor or Elm Park, Reading. If we got battered, we learnt from it and moved on. It’s the stuff of dreams for some players and long may that continue.

I don't think anyone is saying that a tiny country shouldn't be allowed to enter the World Cup. Every country should - that's the beauty of the competition.

Just saying that maybe you have to earn the right to challenge yourselves against the best teams in the world - either by getting your Nations League ranking/FIFA coefficient up, or by winning a first round qualifier against a team with a similarly low ranking.

As it stands, if you're from San Marino or Andorra or some other tiny European nation, you automatically get the chance to get battered by one of football's superpowers every two years, just by virtue of the fact that your country is located in Europe, and UEFA holds the most minnow-friendly qualifiers.

 

[holdsteady]

The condescending comments about ‘pointless mismatches’ and countries who shouldn’t be
’allowed’ to enter the World Cup just smacks of sneery elitism.
Why shouldn’t any country of any size or footballing ability have the opportunity to challenge themselves against the worlds best teams in some of the finest stadiums in the world? When I was kid i always looked forward to playing representative games at The Manor or Elm Park, Reading. If we got battered, we learnt from it and moved on. It’s the stuff of dreams for some players and long may that continue.

The whole point of the World Cup is to find out who is the elite, we already have qualifying tournaments that are seeded, group stages that are seeded. Can’t see how adding an extra, seeded qualifying stage is out of kilter with the status quo? If anything it’s the current let any tiny place start up a football association and enter (just to gain an extra vote when UEFA want one) no matter how few registered players they have that looks out of place.

 

[Ewes]

But this isn’t relevant to anything- men and women have their own competitions. Thankfully you no longer hear people muttering that men would beat top female tennis players, though I remember it in the 70s.

In a thread where the value of the women’s game is being commented on, with respect, I think this is very relevant.

I’ve told you about my support for, and enthusiasm about the women’s game, plus also how a team of 14yo boys can beat the best ‘our country’ has to offer.

Should put everything into perspective methinks. There is no doubt about it - the women’s game is 7-20 years behind the men’s game. No problem with that though, it’s just a fact of life.

 

[Eaststanding]

The whole point of the World Cup is to find out who is the elite, we already have qualifying tournaments that are seeded, group stages that are seeded. Can’t see how adding an extra, seeded qualifying stage is out of kilter with the status quo? If anything it’s the current let any tiny place start up a football association and enter (just to gain an extra vote when UEFA want one) no matter how few registered players they have that looks out of place.

And why shouldn’t they let any ‘tiny place’ do exactly that?! Because it looks out of place? Says who?!

 

[holdsteady]

And why shouldn’t they let any ‘tiny place’ do exactly that?! Because it looks out of place? Says who?!

As has been said they can still enter, just have to win a game or two to play against the better teams. It’s not new to base qualifying on previous performances.

 

[Sarge]

b

As has been said they can still enter, just have to win a game or two to play against the better teams. It’s not new to base qualifying on previous performances.

bit like fa cup preliminary rounds , qualifying rounds etc - prior to 1st n 2nd rounds ... and then the 3rd round

( except they're - Fa Cup preliminaries/ qualifying rounds- all knock out affairs, with out group stages.... though the principle could be applied at any point before qualifying group stages ?)

 

[Wandering Yellow]

It is a mad result but crazy results are quite common in the women's game.