24 more games, that’s almost unbearable. Last years World Cup had quite a few awful and dull games, adding more teams and more games will just make it worse. World Cup should only be the best of the best, that’s what you want to see.

I worry that the World Cup will be bloated now, even more 0-0 draws between poor teams and heavy victories by the ‘big’ teams in the group stages and more importantly no all top 10 matches in the group stages to get excited about early on.

I’d probably only start watching from the knockout stages onwards.

Champions League from 2024/5.

I think it's a good format, but it would just take too long.

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His claim was followed by the ruling from CAS. If they decided that the proof was insufficient, they would keep his ban. What more was he supposed to prove?

Disney isnt known for their great journalism lmao

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Fuck FIFA.

The Russians waited until after the winter Olympics ended to start their invasion. They can wait until the war is over before being allowed into the next one.

No, he plausibly claimed that the positive result was because of food contamination. That’s a long way from proving he was not doping.

https://www.removepaywall.com/https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/14/sports/soccer/2026-world-cup-format.html

I mean, it's true but it sucks when you blatantly see the switch from "let's have the best of the best compite to see who is the actually the best!" to "alright, how can we make more money outta this?".

It not only decreases the quality, it's just fucking sucks. The football calendar it's already insane at the top level. Some players having you to 70 games per (normal) year. The regular WC adds 7 games in 3 weeks for the top 4. Lots of players end up having injuries bexause of how many games they play and how little rest in between games they get.

So, it kinda sucks overall. It's not gonna be a great thing as a result but it's definitely gonna bring more attention to it and most likely bring more turism cash to the hosts.

>Your second paragraph doesn't make sense.

I thought it did:

The civil war began, the talent drain followed.

The civil war ended, but gang violence took over, so the talent drain continued.

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Correct. World says ban Russians. Bye!

Start watching in the second round? Lol idk where the line is drawn before any professional sports tournament gets “too big” but I’m generally a fan of welcoming more competition.

I don’t watch much college basketball during the regular season but it’s always a blast seeing some random small-school team who squeaked into the NCAA tournament go on a run for a few rounds. That’s more energizing/entertaining to me than watching the same blue-blood schools who ultimately win the championship more years than not.

When the scope of the tournament starts having a negative impact on the performance of the championship match then that’s too far imo though

It's ESPN, I'm never surprised at their incompetence

Utter garbage. The only hope for soccer is for Coca Cola and Budweiser to walk away from FIFA

Diluting the product for the sake of money. Short sighted.

Honestly I think more knockout tournaments should have double elimination brackets

Guess you missed people boycotting Soviet athletes at the 1980 Winter Olympics in Lake Placid. Oh wait, you did, because that didn't happen. Good thing, too, or we wouldn't have had the Miracle on Ice.

IOC and the NCAA probably have the same consultants.

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