Many of us can boldly say that we are living in a free and fair world. However, some of us can also boldly stand up and defend the fact that the world is not a free and fair place to live in.
But it is the responsibility of every stakeholder in general to make the world a better place to live in. And today, I stand to express my opinion about how to make the mighty game of football and to be precise, the WORLD CUP TOURNAMENT free and fair so as to give equal chances for every competing team to win.
Allow me to briefly breakdown how the previous world cup tournaments have been organized using the recently concluded world cup in Russia as an example.
There were 32 teams which qualified for the great tournament, and these teams were split into eight groups each having four teams.
Group A
Russia, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Uruguay
Group B
Portugal, Spain, Morocco, Iran
Group C
France, Australia, Peru, Denmark
Group D
Argentina, Iceland, Croatia, Nigeria
Group E
Brazil, Switzerland, Costa Rica, Serbia
Group F
Germany, Mexico, Sweden, South Korea
Group G
Belgium, Panama, Tunisia, England
Group H
Poland, Senegal, Colombia, Japan
These were the groups that were formed from the draws that were conducted, and the results were what we saw simply because some of the teams were handed relatively soft groups, hence were theoretically expected to have relatively straightforward route to the higher levels of the competitions especially quarter-finals where the heavy clashes were expected to begin from.
Also, some of the "Weaker" teams had the advantage of avoiding some of the biggest hitters like Brazil which doesn't look free and fair as far as the beautiful game is concerned.
In my opinion, the world cup tournament is to be organized just like how the other football leagues are organized, I mean it should involved the teams playing each other home and away across the duration.
And in the same way, three points are awarded for a win, one point for a draw and none for a defeat, with the team with the most points at the end of the tournament winning the World cup trophy.
And if two teams finish with the same number of points, their position in the world cup table is determined by goal difference, then the number of goals scored.
This is how the world cup table of 2018 would have been had this system been used!
POSITION
1 FRANCE
2 CROATIA
3 BELGIUM
4 ENGLAND
5 RUSSIA
6 BRAZIL
7 SWEDEN
8 URUGUAY
9 ARGENTINA
10 JAPAN
11 COLOMBIA
12 SPAIN
13 DENMARK
14 PORTUGAL
15 SWITZERLAND
16 MEXICO
17 SENEGAL
18 IRAN
19 SOUTH KOREA
20 PERU
21 NIGERIA
22 GERMANY
23 SERBIA
24 POLAND
25 TUNISIA
26 SAUDI ARABIA
27 MOROCCO
28 ICELAND
29 COSTA RICA
30 AUSTRALIA
31 EGYPT
32 PANAMA
AND IN THIS WAY, A I BELIEVE THAT A TOTALLY FREE AND FAIR WORLD CUP TOURNAMENT WILL BE ACHIEVED.
BUT WOULD FRANCE BE CROWNED THE WORLD CUP CHAMPIONS OF 2018????
