Is there too much international football?
It pains me to say that one of the things that most annoys me about modern day football is international football. Don’t get me wrong, I look forward to every World Cup as much as the next fan. I usually watch at least 80% of the games of both the World Cup and the European Championship, and although the excitement levels are not as high for me as when I watch my club team play, I recognize the value of a great game being seen by hundreds of millions around the world.
What seriously irritates me is when international football encroaches on club football. All European leagues will be interrupted for international games three times in the first three months of next season. Just after the season begins there will be a break in top level club football on the weekend of 8/9 September, this will be followed by further breaks for internationals on the weekends of 13/14 October and 17/18 November. I know I am not the only one who finds these breaks frustrating. Watching an international game is not usually enough to feed my football addiction so the two weeks between “proper” matches can seem like an eternity.
So, what would I do about it? First, I’d try to find a way of reducing the number of international games that are played. In the qualifying stage for next summer’s European Championship there are 50 national teams competing for 14 places. As hosts, Austria and Switzerland have automatically qualified. The current format has the 50 teams divided into six groups of 7 and one group of 8, with the first two teams of each group qualifying. This means twelve qualifying games for most teams and fourteen for the teams in the eight-team group.
My suggestion would be to increase the number of groups so that each group had fewer teams and therefore fewer games. For example, to find 14 qualifiers from 50 teams, there could be ten groups of 4 teams (with one qualifier per group) and two groups of 5 (top two qualify), or alternatively it could be eight groups of 4 and six groups of 3 with only the top team from each group qualifying. Either way there would be fewer qualifying games for everyone. This would improve the qualifying matches themselves as each game would be that little bit more important and therefore more exciting. You could not draw 0-0 at home to Macedonia and expect to get another chance.
Another possible way of reducing the number of teams in the qualifying groups would be to have the lower ranking national teams play off against each other before getting the chance to play the bigger nations. These preliminary games could be played at the same time as the major tournaments, the players of Andorra and San Marino are not usually doing much during the World Cup. The downside of this, of course, would be for the players of the smaller nations who would not have the same chances to play against the world’s best, but if they are not good enough at club level why should they get the chance that so many English, French or Spanish players from lower leagues miss out on?
This season sees a further problem for the many clubs who will lose players for the African Nations Cup. Would it not be possible to play the European Championship, the Copa America and the African Nations Cup at the same time? Of course, the Copa America would only be played every four years, but it would give clubs and players more time to prepare for the real business of the club season.
Ultimately, fewer international matches would mean fewer irritating mid-season breaks in our beloved league season. Clubs would lose fewer players through injury on international duty, and fans would not find themselves being annoyed by international games which ought to represent football at its highest level.
Nig writes at the excellent Barca blog.
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Discussion - 11 Responses
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I agree with playing the three continental tournaments at the same time but I think that the smaller nations should be in the groups because that is the way it has been with every cup tournament since they started. Look at the FA cup for example, Man United usually get someone like Exeter City in the third round. Exeter aren’t going to complain because they get to play against United and United arent going to complain because they are pretty much guaranteed a win. Another thing is that the small club/country get a huge payday out of filling their ground which happens very rarely so it kind of spreads the wealth.
Also today on sky sports there was something that may scare Barcelona fans everywhere. Newcastle are after Ronaldinho. Be Afraid, Be very afraid
Couldn’t have put it better myself, I get so frustrated watching international football which is quite often of a poorer standard than club football. Although I prefer your idea of smaller but more groups to the idea of teams having to play off to get in, doesn’t seem very fair. There again by that logic neither is the seeding system…
Yes, in essence I agree. The problem isn’t so much the quantity of matches as the organization of them. There has been talk of a unified calendar for years but it hasn’t really happened.
I totally agree with the argument about the small nations. In fact, I’d go one step further: organize a separate tournament for them. Let them join on a volunteer basis, and limit participation to those countries whose FIFA rankings are below a certain cutoff (say 125 and below, to give an example); you could also put in place other limits such as population.
But by having a “2nd division” of International football you could make several parties happy. FIFA, which is only interested in making money, would now have double the amount of tournaments, and while it wouldn’t be double the income it would be a significant increase. The smaller countries would receive a lot more exposure and actually have the chance of winning something. The larger (or read: better) countries would not have to waste time and resources on meaningless qualifiers against teams ranked 100 places or more below them.
Back to unifying the calendar: Tournaments should all be played at the same time of the year. I honestly dont care when, but at the same time. It is absurd to have Copa America in odd-numbered years, every two years, it is absurd to have the ANC in February. Just to name two examples. Whether FIFA or the rest of the world likes it or not, UEFA and European Club football are the economic motors of the sport, and should be the primary consideration when making this calendar. There should be a designated time for vacations as well. Players, especially those at the top level, now play a ridiculous amount of matches. Robinho, to name an example, will probably play (between club matches, copa america, and friendlies) 65 or 70 matches in the 2007 calendar year. He is young and can handle it, older players (not old, just “older”) already try to get out of playing many kinds of matches in order to rest. I realize they are millionaires, but the body and the mind have their limits. Let there be a 2 or 3 week period every year when there is absolutely NO football. I think it would be good to avoid saturation, for players and fans.
And qualifiers should be played all together. Not interspersed. Let there be, say, over the 18 month period that is required for qualifiers, 3 or 4 months entirely dedicated to them (example, for the 2010 world cup, set aside: Nov 2008, June 2009, and Nov 2009 as qualification months) this way, teams will gel much better, the quality of football will increase, and there will be fewer issues regarding players traveling around the globe and missing club matches.
Finally, friendlies: more or less, do away with them, with the exception of one or two at the beginning of the aforementioned qualifier months.
There are far too many meaningless and mundane friendlies being played and the number of games teams must play within their qualification groups for big tournaments have become very taxing and detrimental to club football. Top echelon clubs are playing close to 70 matches a year. Add to that all the internationals thrown in and it is no wonder Ronaldo, Lampard, Gerrard and so many other big name stars had no gas left for their big Champions League or FA Cup matches in April and May. Is there anything more irritating than waiting all summer for the season to begin in England only to have the teams take 12 days off for international requirements after only one week of Prem matches. Ridiculous. I am tired of useless qualifiers like Germany vs San Marino. FIFA have to wake up and realize that World Football does not have to play fair and allow everybody to compete. Club leagues have divisions, so must international football. England, Germany, France, Italy, Spain and Holland should bot have to play more than 6 qualifiers to get into any major tournament. With that said, the World Cup should be a showcase of the finest national sides on the planet rather than 32 nations. Have two World Cups with a seeding system based on pedigree and five year form charts.
Make the World Cup 16 to 24 teams and cut out the useless friendlies between giants and minnows unless it is National B sides competing. The best players in the world are not at their best come World Cup or European Championships time because they have played too many matches.
I’m not a big fan of Rugby but I like how they have an uninterupted dosmestic season, then an International season.
Why not do the same with domestic and international football. By having an uninterrupted season you could finish seaon earlier without the distraction of international football even playing midweek games if needed. Then setting aside a month or two at the end of the season (may and june) to play tournaments or qualifiers which will also give players time to have a break before the start of the next season.
Friendlies seem to be a waste of time, more of a hindrance than a benefit. They’re meant to be practice matches so the national team can get time playing together however the teams rarely play well, never put in 100% and it ends up being an experimentation of players in different formations and positions than their used to. With an international season there is no need to keep having practice matches during the season.
Nig you are too and most commentors on here are too unserious. You should asking for a mandatory winter break for all European clubs in January. On top of a reduction in size of all top leagues to 18. Rather than mourning about international football. Without international football most foreign nationals would not be able to get work permits all over Europe. Bottom line clubs football has too many games. How the heck can international be blamed for adding a few games to club football that already has close to 70 games in it for top echelon clubs? Yet they want to blame it on the international calender. Which is nothing sort of stupid.
The only Unified calender Idea that will work is having all the major European leagues, having the same number of teams, starting and ending at the same time, and a mandatory winter break from early January to mid February. That break could be set aside for Internationals and tournaments like Nations Cups without affecting the domestic calendar. Furthermore meaningless trophies like League Cups and Carling Cups should be scrapped all together from domestic calendars leaving only the league and local FA CUP’s as the paths to Europe.
And FYI. The African Nations Cup, Asian Cup and COPA America can’t be played at the same time as the European Cup. It’s obvious first off that the European cup will over shadow both tournaments. Secondly in Africa the summer months of Europe are at the time of the heaviest rains in Africa. When football is next to unplayable. Also people in Europe tend to forget Africa sides are trying to becoming as good as the European ands South American counterparts. Playing a major international football tournament amongst themselves once every four years will not cut the mustard
i wish they’d add some more international games,throw in a semi world cup in th mix if you will.Tired of talking transfer and not watching a decent game for three months.If it wasn’t for copa america and waking up in the morning to watch the highlights and repeats this off season would have sucked.
Yes, there is by far too much football.
I don’t find it half as interesting as league games, and it disrupts the season.
Most players are more interested in club football now, anyway, take the recent events with Jamie Carragher for example. There are however a small number who are focused on international football, and international football alone, take Michael Owen for example.
The people more interested in club football would outweigh the other group every time, and should therefore be scrapped, because if the players are not interested in playing, then the standard is quite clearly less of that in their leagues.
I say introduce ‘World Cups’ for the clubs, instead of the one that runs in December disrupting the league, once again. Introduce the tournament with more teams.
Or even just create a summer cup for clubs within the British Isles. I think that would be a better idea than the current internationals, and even the World Club Cup..
Your arguments are biased towards club football, i love international football as it is the purest manifestation of the game, players representing their nations proudly, making their country proud instead of playing for an XXXXXXXXXXXXX amount of $$$$$$$$$$$
[…] blogger Nig recently posted an article stating that he thinks there should be less international play, because it affects many clubs in Europe and it generally isn’t the same quality of play that […]
Simply no.