FIFA's decision to change the allocation of World Cup berths has raised a few eyebrows and has one confederation especially angry.
The changes have repercussions for all continental bodies but CONMEBOL, the South American football confederation, can rightly feel that it has gotten the worst of it. FIFA has decided that South America will have four spots at the next soccer world cup, one less than the usual five and add to that the fact that Brazil, as holders, will not qualify automatically and one can see why a continent that boasts the majority of past World Cup winner can feel wrongly done by.
Europe will also lose a spot and will send only 13 teams to Germany, 14 including the hosts. The two lost spots provide for an automatic spot to Oceania winner and allow for, remarkably, a playoff between the fourth placed North American and the fifth placed Asian teams. The circumstances behind Oceania getting a long demanded automatic spot are purely political and shouldn't be attributed to the progress that Australian players have made in Europe. World Cup berths must only be considered after continued improvement at the World Cup itself, it is true that Oceania winners can note that they have been treated unfairly having to playoff with a South American team to get to the World Cup nevertheless an automatic berth will more than likely mean weakening the level of play at the World Cup even further.
The south American federation have made a proposal to increase the size of the World Cup to 36 or even 40 teams, as a shrewd attempt to gain the lost berth back. The idea has been rejected by FIFA president Sepp Blatter but is still on the agenda of the FIFA meetings due to take place in late May. Some of the reasons that this proposal is unreasonable are clear, firstly a 32 team World Cup is a strain on most possible candidates let alone a 36 team one, many nations are simply be unable to host a World Cup under its current format and increasing its size will mean even less can even if the idea of co-hosting is to be revisited. There are other obstacles to the increase, the qualification process and certainly the World Cup itself will have to last longer with more matches to be played and that will, as it has already, concern top clubs around the world, player release for national team duty being a hot issue already. One must also remember that an increase in size will mean even more unattractive fixtures like the 1998 match between Japan and Jamaica, match-ups that are not worthy of such a competetion.
FIFA is a highly political institution as it influence reaches very far and in many countries around the world decisions made are hotly contested and its biggest event, the World Cup naturally garners the most attention and debate.