Under the Oak

(This is the second of a series of posts to help give some background for the FIFA World Cup taking place in June 2010. I’m hoping that by giving some of the background for the World Cup and maybe some basics of the game itself, I can drum up some interest among friends and family)

1. A History Lesson
2. How it works

As promised, we will take a look in this post at how international soccer competition is organized and specifically how the 2010 World Cup will be organized.

I thought that guy played for. . .

Before we look at how the competition between teams is organized, lets take a look at the teams themselves. In chatting with folks about soccer, I’ve found that one thing about it that confuses them at first is who plays for who and when. In each country there are one or more leagues, and naturally each league has its own teams, schedule, playoffs, and other competitions. We can call these teams “clubs.”

Occasionally, there are competitions between leagues in which the best clubs from each league come together in a cup or playoff format (e.g., CONCACAF Champion’s Cup in North America or UEFA Champion’s Cup in Europe). While these are international in nature, they are competitions between “clubs” and not “national teams.”

National teams such as those that will compete in the World Cup are made up of the best players who are citizens of that nation regardless of what league or nation their “club” is a part of.  For instance, Tim Howard, the probable goalkeeper for the US national team, is an American playing for Everton FC, an English Premier League team. It does not matter that he is living and playing in England. He is an American, so he plays for the US national team (if he plays at all). Some players have dual citizenship and are forced to choose which national team they will play for. They can change their mind, but they must do so before they reach a certain age. The only parallel I can think of in another sport is something like Olympic basketball or baseball. Sure, Yao Ming plays his league ball for Houston, but come Olympics time, he’ll be wearing a Chinese jersey.

When a club player is asked to play for his national team, this is referred to as being “called up.” Since the World Cup is still some months away, the actual team that will be playing has not yet been “called up,” so we’ll have to look at the specific players when it gets closer to killin’ time.

National teams sometimes organize competitions with one another to test their strength or a certain combination of players (its like having the world’s largest bench…so there is a lot to be worked out). These matches are referred to as “friendlies,” and have no bearing on any of the international competitions. They are necessary since there is no FIFA “season” between national teams.

How the World Cup Works

Qualification: From 203 to 32

FIFA organizes a World Cup once every four years. There are 203 national teams recognized by FIFA. The difficulties of organizing a playoff for that many teams are similar to those which keep NCAA football from having one. FIFA deals with this using a three year long qualification stage. The qualification stage is meant to weed out all but the top 31 teams. The country hosting the World Cup automatically qualifies making the total number of World Cup competitors 32. A list of the teams that qualified for the 2010 World Cup can be found here.

The Group Stage: From 32 to 16

The Group Stage of the FIFA World Cup is really the true beginning of the competition. All the teams travel to the host country (South Africa in this case) and play at different locations throughout that country. The 32 teams are divided into Groups A through H with 4 teams in each group. Each team will play every one in their group once (a total of three games). The teams accumulate points from each game – 3 for a win, 1 for a draw, and 0 for a loss. At the conclusion of the Group Stage, the two teams with the most points in each group will advance to Stage 2 (ties are broken by cumulative goals). The other two teams from each group get to pack their bags.

Inevitably, some groups are easier than others. For instance, Group A automatically has South Africa as the top seed.  SA automatically qualified as the host country and are a substantially weaker team  than the rest. Therefore anyone in that group is pretty much assured of at least 3 points. Other groups are much harder, and the hardest is often referred to as the “group of death.” For instance, the general consensus is that Group G is this year’s “group of death” because it contains three strong teams (Brazil, Portugal, and the Ivory Coast) along with one weak team (North Korea). This means that at least one strong team is not going to make it past the first stage!

The groups are selected during the World Cup Draw. The draw took place on December 4 and you can watch it here. The USA drew Group C along with England, Algeria, and Slovenia. Algeria and Slovenia are not especially strong teams, but hey…they made it to the World Cup, so they aren’t to be underestimated either. England…well…that’s going to be a tough game.

Many an Englishman will cry himself to sleep that fateful night.

The Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, and Final: From 16 to 1

After the Group Stage, each match is an elimination match. The only exception is the Semifinals when the two losing teams will play one another to decide who finishes 3rd and 4th. These elimination games are tense and dramatic. Every touch of the ball has the potential to fulfill or destroy four years worth of collective national dreams.

The FIFA World Cup Final is the most watched sporting event in the world. Ever.

And there you have it. We’ve been working toward South Africa since 2006. Now we’re there, and while we have a tough start against England, we have very good chances of getting out of the Group Stage, and from there…who knows what could happen!

Next Up: Some vocabulary you’ll want to know

Coach Bob Bradley, US Men's National Team