World Cup 2018 - General discussion

A thread for general discussion in the build-up to the World Cup.

The draw takes place on Friday (3 PM GMT).

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Serbia in pot 4 after winning the group is harsh

Such a silly system, Poland in group 1 and Spain in group 2

I think these pots should be determined by a combination of the results in qualifying for this tournament and the results of the LAST edition of this tournament. Serbia won their poule and are rewarded with a spot in port 4. It's dumb. Meaningless friendlies deciding in what pot you end up. Friendly international matches arent a good indicator of your teams level. Tournaments and qualification matches are.

I'm already nervous for this as teams like us will have their tournament pretty much decided by the draw. More importantly than the teams that stay in our group are the teams that stay in the group next to ours that we'll be facing in the round of 16 in case we go past the group.

I'd rather get Spain, Costa Rica, Japan and stay next to a group of Russia, Peru, Iran and Morocco than a group of Peru, Iran, Morocco and stay next to a group of Brazil, Spain, Sweden and Japan as that would mean there would be no chance of getting to the quarters.

I've clearly given this too much thought. I've done about 50 draw simulations here
http://ultra.zone/2018-FIFA-World-Cup-Group-Stage-Draws

That pot b its a huge problem.

Waiting for our group

Pots way better balanced than in previous cups. Guess you can always complain.

Spain went out in the group stage so I doubt they would be pot 1 with your version. Where do you get the idea from that Poland earned their spot with dumb meaningless friendlies anyway?

Wouldn't it be more interesting if there was no seeding?

I know they did, we beat then 5-1

The pots are based on the ranking which is based in part on results in friendly matches, which I think is silly.

Rubbish competition for rubbish people, means nothing, a big waste of money, a non-entertaining circus. This world cup malarkey should just be abolished

Should play the world cup of curling is instead, now that's a real competition everyone wants to watch

Potential draw: Brazil, Spain, Senegal, Serbia.

Just no Brasil and Serbia.

And some African or South American country.

What the

He's Italian

They seem to take the cup seriously when they win... not sure what this guy's on about.

It's a pointless competition nobody cares about. Should just get rid of it now. No point playing it next year really. Let's all do something else

Hosts usually get a soft draw don't they?

Russia will get something like Peru, Costa Rica and Saudi Arabia.

They'll probably struggle to get out of that group but obviously means harder teams from pot 2 and 3 are going in with another big hitter from pot 1.

Doesn't matter who England get, even it's an easy draw they'll find a way of messing it up.

If the squad is picked on form and not names alone England could get to the Semis. Strong Captain needed too...

@giorno is just taking piss, Italy failed to qualify and he is acting like World Cup does not matter.

I don´t know how to tell you this, but the Italian Men´s national team failed to qualify for the 2018 World Championships five days ago.

Am going to follow Belgium this time around. Love the team that have, the most talented of all teams entered.

According to one of the Polish posters on here (I can’t remember which) Poland have taken loads of easy friendlies which resulted in their high ranking.

SERIOUSLY?!?! What the....

allright, World Cup of Drinking and long distance pissing. Who's up for it? Doesn't that sound better than Saudi Arabia-Morocco?

You're just saying that cos we won last time. :P

Oh, yes... that's right. I heard about that. It looked more like the papers were on about Buffon retiring, but I figured there must be a reason why he's retiring. It does feel weird, doesn't it? Going to the tournament of the best national teams and Italy not being in it. It's almost as if... wow, this could be it. Italy has always and will always be our achilles heel. Now that they're out. We might be able to defend the title! Hype!

It's not true. We have barely played any extra friendlies since 2015, we've actually avoided friendlies.

We played two friendlies in 2015, against Iceland and Czech Republic which are not really easy friendlies. We played Serbia, Finland in March 2016, and then before Euro we played Netherlands and Lithuania (which we didn't even win). We played Uruguay and Mexico recently but this was already after seedings had been announced.

During same time Spain have played Korea, Bosnia, Belgium, Romania, Italy, Georgia. It's not really a hugely tougher set of games.

We got a very good seed because we absolutely cruised through our last two qualifiers and didn't even lose a single game at the last Euro.

Curling's fecking awesome.

Yeah while failing to qualify for the Curling World Championships with an abysmal 2-7 record, Italy still managed to beat Germany.

I was thinking the same too - if there was something a bit shady about them always getting the easy draws.

So I went back and checked out the last 4 World Cups. Hosts are in bold, and I've ranked them after what place in the group they ended up:

Brazil
Mexico
Croatia
Cameroun

Uruguay
Mexico
South Africa
France

Germany
Poland
Ecuador
Costa Rica

South Korea
USA
Portugal
Poland

Japan
Belgium
Russia
Tunesia

3/5 have been easy - the other 2 kind of standard I'd say. France in 2010 when South Africa drew them were in a bad state and finished last. Japan / South Korea 2002 has later been busted in being pretty fecked up with the corruption. I don't see how Russia 2018 should be any different.

By the way: Whichever team from Europe who draws Russia or Poland from group 1 are almost sure to have a nice group, since there can only be 2 european teams in one group - and only normal/average teams from South America are therefore left. Hopefully that country to have the lucky Poland/Russia draw will be Denmark

Russia, Costa Rica and Peru in Australia's group would be nice.

World Cup draw, Porto-Benfica and Napoli-Juve. Not bad for a Friday.

The most important one is absolutely Sporting vs Belenenses more seriously, I want Spain in our group just to start with excuses for our elimination from the group stage, "strong team", "bad luck", the portuguese way, I have a bad feeling related to this next WC.

They always do. I've never been afraid of Brazil or Spain (although they soundly beat us a couple of times, too). But Italy? When we meet them in tourneys, they always feck us up. Always. And I never know quite how they do it.

Just did one of those simulations and got England in group H with Germany, Iran and Nigeria. Brazil and Spain were in group G!

Guess that's pretty much nightmare scenario number 1?

Iran football fans' advice for presenter's dress
http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-42107916

"I urge you avoid to wearing a sexy dress during the draw so it is possible for us to watch the draw completely. We cannot watch when you wear revealing clothes."
"This is very important. We would like see you live without censor and this matter depends on your dress."

If only!! Would love to see a proper group of death! They should do away with seeding in all competitions but it will never happen.