England v Costa Rica

[vikingTON]

If Capello was the worst manager of all time for scraping a plodding England side to the Second Round in 2010, surely Roy 'Bassett' Hodgson will have his face sown onto a turnip for an unsurpassed humiliation in an international tournament?

If not, why not?

[invergowrie arab]

If Capello was the worst manager of all time for scraping a plodding England. side to the Second Round in 2010, surely Roy 'Bassett' Hodgson will have his face sown onto a turnip for an unsurpassed humiliation in an international tournament?

If not, why not?

A gentleman, not a swarthy foreigner, speaks English, blending a young (lol) squad

[Lex]

A convenient draw here.

Guarantees Costa Rica win the group and it's a consolation point for poor wee England.

Yep. I think Cameroon have just pipped England for the title of biggest tournament laughing stock so far.

[Paranoid]

England are truly pish. Sadly we are pisher.

[banana]

England are truly pish. Sadly we are pisher.

A couple of quality centre backs would improve our chances tremendously. I don't think we are actually that far behind elsewhere on the pitch, and we've proven many times that we can give the big teams a right good game, unlike England.

[Scary Bear]

Surely the worst group of all eight and England by far the poorest of all four competing teams

We'll soon find out when we see how Uruguay and Costa Rica do in the knock-out stages.

[craigkillie]

A combination of the two, FIFA/UEFA will still count England friendlies against international sides significantly inferior in their favour, and there's always the "Wembley" factor for teams that still seem to be "overwhelmed" playing there.

International friendlies against "inferior" sides tend to actually reduce a team's ranking rather than improve it. Holland missed out on being seeded for this WC because they played a friendly against Indonesia - even though they won, the low ranking of their opponents meant it contributed so few ranking points that it actually brought their overall average down.

The UEFA coefficient for determining seedings for the Euros doesn't include friendly results, and England still ended up in the top seeds for that.

How come your argument has changed from "FIFA/UEFA won't allow it for commercial reasons" to "They're only there because of friendlies and because they're good at home"?

[Tommy Nooka]

It won't happen, but not for the batshit mental conspiracy reasons you suggest. It won't happen because despite not being very good, England are still comfortably in the top 10-15 in Europe. I'm not sure how you'd expect UEFA or FIFA to fix something which is based on a predetermined set of criteria driven by results and results alone.

Then they shouldn't be top seeds but we all know they will be.

[forameus]

Then they shouldn't be top seeds but we all know they will be.

There's 9 World Cup Qualifying groups (which are seeded using World Ranking. In the Euros qualifying, England will more than likely finish first, winning the vast majority of their games. Even if they fail again at Euro 2016, they will be within the top 9 European nations. So yes, they will be top seeds.

The "top 10-15" nations in Europe I think is a bit harsh too. Currently in the rankings for Europe the top 10 is...

Spain

Germany

Portugal

Switzerland

Italy

England

Belgium

Greece

Netherlands

Ukraine

The teams in bold are through to the next round at least, and the ones in italics either could or should be. Spain will drop, but I doubt by too much, certainly not enough for England to catch up. Italy will remain above England, and I'd expect all the sides through to overtake both Italy and England. So England will probably be 9th in Europe following the tournament. That will improve come the Euro 2016 qualifying, so they'll have absolutely no trouble being top seeds come 2018 qualifying.

EDIT: Just realised France are in 11th, and they'll be extremely likely to make a big jump, so that will probably put England 10th. Out of top seed territory, but they'll make up that shortfall in the next two years. They're a very good qualification team, just terrible at tournaments.

[Raidernation]

International friendlies against "inferior" sides tend to actually reduce a team's ranking rather than improve it. Holland missed out on being seeded for this WC because they played a friendly against Indonesia - even though they won, the low ranking of their opponents meant it contributed so few ranking points that it actually brought their overall average down.

The UEFA coefficient for determining seedings for the Euros doesn't include friendly results, and England still ended up in the top seeds for that.

How come your argument has changed from "FIFA/UEFA won't allow it for commercial reasons" to "They're only there because of friendlies and because they're good at home"?

My argument hasn't changed, if you actually read and comprehend what's written, but the seeding system will always favour the countries with the biggest audiences and sponsors, in any way it can, and keep the "big" nations at the top/in the top pots. As to being "good at home" there are sill too many countries and too many officials that seem to be "overwhelmed" playing at Weburlee for some reason, and engerlund take full advantage

[craigkillie]

My argument hasn't changed, if you actually read and comprehend what's written, but the seeding system will always favour the countries with the biggest audiences and sponsors, in any way it can, and keep the "big" nations at the top/in the top pots.

I'm going to need elaboration on this point. The seeding systems for UEFA and FIFA are both based entirely on results. The criteria are transparent and known to all participants in advance. In what way does this "favour" any nation?