World Cup Group Play Tie-Breaking Rules

June 18th, 2006 | by: WC Bob |

Update for 2010!
With more than a few groups likely to be decided during the final group play matches, it is worth taking a look at the tie-breaking rules that could decide which teams advance to the round of 16 and which teams get an early flight home from South Africa. From the FIFA rules here, Article 39-5 of the FIFA rule book:

The ranking of each team in each group will be determined as follows:

a) greatest number of points obtained in all group matches;
b) goal difference in all group matches;
c) greatest number of goals scored in all group matches.
If two or more teams are equal on the basis of the above three criteria, their rankings will be determined as follows:
d) greatest number of points obtained in the group matches between the teams concerned;
e) goal difference resulting from the group matches between the teams concerned;
f) greater number of goals scored in all group matches between the teams concerned;
g) drawing of lots by the FIFA Organising Committee.

This all seems well and good, but personally I’d like to see more weight given to head-to-head results. If two teams finish with the same number of points but one team has beaten the other, I think the winning team deserves to go through. It should be as simple as that.

While I don’t expect it to happen this year, the final tie breaker involving the drawing of lots sure would be dramatic. I only hope that Heidi Klum (or should that be R Kelly for 2010?) is standing by to be the official lottery ball selector.

What do you think? Is this a fair system for breaking first round ties?

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http://radix-lecti.blogspot.com Prashanth

err…when two teams are tied..the winner does go through.

greatest number of points obtained in the group matches between the teams concerned; —what else could this mean!
http://www.club810.com Dinu

Prashanth, I think Bob is saying that he’d like the head-to-head record to be the first tiebreaker, not way down the list.

That’s usually the case here in North American sports. I don’t mind goal differential being the first tiebreaker, but think that head to head is more important than total goals scored
dirk

FIFA is an incompetent decision maker
Bobbio

If Sweden just happens to lose to England 0-2 and Trinidad beats Paraguay 1-0, then things may go down to drawing lots.
http://www.trinidadtobago.worldcupblog.org stacy-marie

Bobbio – I know, it’s nailbiting. And Bob, in that case – since we’ve drawn with Sweden, by your criteria – we’re still stuck!
Dave Hamilton

Head-to-head should decide all “ties” after the points gained in each group. That is about as decisive as it gets!

Dave hamildav@yahoo.com
paul

go korea!!!
Coyote

Without a doubt, head-to-head winner should be the #1 tiebreaker. Can you imagine Italy over the Czechs and the US over Ghana on Thursday ending with the US tied with the Czechs and advancing on goal differential? Not even us Americans would feel good about that.

Decide it on the field first.
Tim

Coyote: if the US wins and the Czechs lose, the US will have 4 points, the Czechs merely 3.

If the US wins and the Czechs tie, however it would come down to goal differential. Right now the US is -3 and the Czechs are +1. I do not see the US defeating Ghana 4-0.
Mircea

There is no “fair” way of deciding who goes through. I think it’s better not to have the direct games decide.
Remember what happened in Euro 2004 when Denmark and Sweden needed a 2-2 draw to make sure they both go through, and guess what..it happened.
The exact same situation is avoided now in group G.
http://none Greg

I think the tiebreakers in group play are all fine and good.

What I get upset about is the penalty kicks overtime. There is no way that the World Cup Final, or any knockout stage match for that matter, should be decided on a shootout. I say play Golden Goal until 7AM if you have to….
David Caldarelli

Absolutely. Head to head should be right after (a).

In addition to avoiding the awful case where two teams are tied in points, and the loser of their head-to-head goes through (obviously not fair), by using goal difference first, you encourage injury-prone desperation at all times during the match, even if one team has a comfortable lead and would like to rest their good players, or players recovering from injury.

The Denmark-Sweden case mentioned above is an interesting point (if it’s true that the head-head rule allowed that to happen), but Italy (who didn’t make it because of that tie) is ultimately responsible for their own fate – if they were deserving that year, they should have won more of their games, and not lost/tied to two other teams who then could advance by tying eachother.

And I am an Italy supporter, who was furious at the obvious collusion there! But head-head is still superior for tiebreaking.

David
http://federalismproject.org/supremecourt/?p=17 The Federalism Project | Supreme Court Update

[...] We’ve been puzzling out the various tie-breakers all week and here is what we’ve got: if the USA beats Ghana, and the adjacent tribuatary over the berm loses to or ties the naviagable-in-fact water, then the Roberts concurrence faces the Corps of Engineers in a winner-take-all penalty kickoff. Otherwise, the Scalia plurality holds. Sometimes. Sometimes, we’ll use the Stevens or Breyer dissent just for kicks. Not always. The Court has decided that we aren’t sure yet and might not be sure for some time. [...]
mark

I don’t like this system. Drawing lots should never be used as a tiebreaker. There must be some way to decide based upon performance on the field, even if you have to compare shots on goal, time of possession, or fewest cards/fouls.

None of these would be great ways to determine which team advances, but certainly better than random chance, in my opinion.
Patrick

Group G
If:
SUI – KOR; 0 – 0
FRA – TOG; 2 – 1
Then:
SUI: 5 pts, +2 GD
KOR: 5 pts, +1 GD, 3 GF
FRA: 5 pts, +1 GD, 3 GF
Switzerland advances, South Korea and France draw lots to determine who advances! That’s just wrong!
gigi

How many subs are you allowed per game????
Mike

3
Bogdan

We should not resort to drawing of lots to determine who gets through. If all base stats are the same for two or more teams, decision should be based on fair play performance (red&yellow cards and number of fauls called), then on ball possession time and then on current FIFA ranking, if necessary. Don’t go random! Human error introduced by the referees and the fact that in the 21st century FIFA still can not resort to video review of the most critical moments in game (goals, off sides, penalties) introduces enough random factor.