World Cup 2010, March Madness Style

March 15th, 2010 | by: Daryl |

angle-bracket American sports fans are about to go crazy with March Madness. For those unfamiliar, it’s a 64 team NCAA college basketball knockout tournament (or 65 teams if you count tomorrow’s play-in game). The teams are seeded and then organized into a bracket where the high seeds open by playing the low seeds and everything rolls from there. Obviously not everyone’s happy with their seed, and there’s always plenty of complaining once the bracket is released.

The World Cup isn’t quite organized like this, but March Madness seems like a perfect excuse to pretend it was. So I’ve ranked all the qualified World Cup teams #1 to #32, based on the March 3rd, 2010 FIFA World Ranking. Below you’ll find those seedings, followed by what the World Cup 2010 March Madness style bracket would look like.

#1 Spain
#2 Brazil
#3 Netherlands
#4 Italy
#5 Germany
#6 Portugal
#7 France
#8 England
#9 Argentina
#10 Greece
#11 Serbia
#12 Chile
#13 Mexico
#14 Switzerland
#15 USA
#16 Uruguay
#17 Cameroon
#18 Nigeria
#19 Cote d’Ivoire
#20 Australia
#21 Slovenia
#22 Ghana
#23 Paraguay
#24 Slovakia
#25 Algeria
#26 Denmark
#27 Honduras
#28 Japan
#29 South Korea
#30 New Zealand
#31 South Africa
#32 North Korea

FIRST ATTEMPT AT WORLD CUP 2010 BRACKET:
WC 2010 BRACKET MARCH MADNESS STYLE RESIZED

Created using ExcelTemplates

Tough draw for hosts South Africa, who face #2 seed Brazil in the opening round. Don’t fancy North Korea’s chances vs Spain either. A victory for the #32 seed there would be quite the upset. Some other intriguing first round games like Australia vs Mexico, USA vs Nigeria and Ghana vs Serbia too, but – just like in the real World Cup – the big games will come in the second round. If I’m reading that bracket correctly then we could be seeing England vs Germany, Brazil vs USA and France vs Portugal in “Sweet 16″.

Which reminds me. One caveat for this World Cup 2010 March Madness bracket: I think I’d want to change some of the names as we progress through the knockouts. I’m thinking we ditch “Final Four” in favour of something like “Awesome Foursome”.

SECOND ATTEMPT AT WORLD CUP 2010 BRACKET:
Commenter Brad spotted that something wasn’t quite right with our bracket, because the way it played out didn’t match the NCAA format from the second round onwards. He left three (in his own words “somewhat strident”) comments on the matter, and turns out he was correct. So, for Brad, and for everyone else out there that would prefer we did this properly, here’s the new World Cup 2010 March Madness style bracket:

bracket 2

In this version, if the top seeds all win in the first round, then the seeds for the second round all add up to 17. Which basically means the top teams are more evenly distributed. The new bracket throws up some interesting possibilities, like #8 England vs #9 Argentina and #1 Brazil vs #15 USA in the second round.

How do you see this new bracket playing out?

- For those interested in actual World Cup bracketology, we have World Cup 2010 wall charts available for download here.

International Football News – World Cup Blog RSS Feed

http://australia.worldcupblog.org Luka

I’d take Mexico anyday!
http://scotland.worldcupblog.org Ian

England v. Germany would be a tasty round of 16 matchup.
http://www.worldcupblog.org Daryl

With Italy possibly waiting for the winner in the quarterfinals.
jittah

colombia?
http://www.worldcupblog.org Daryl

Hmm. For some reason I had Colombia in there instead of New Zealand. If anyone has a logical explanation for this, please share.

Thanks for spotting that jittah, updating now.
http://www.worldcupblog.org Daryl

Luckily that doesn’t change things too dramatically. Except that #3 seed Netherlands now has a much much easier draw against #30 seed New Zealand, and Italy now has a rematch with 2002 conquerer South Korea in the first round.
Coconut

Wait Daryl….if we can get Valderama and Higuita to play, i’d be more inclined to let Columbia stay.

Australia/Mexico seems like a good game, as does Uruguay/Cameroon. If MEX/ARG would advance, it would be an awesome rematch to the 2006 R16 match.

Damn you M. Rodriguez! I hope you know i always sub you out when i pick Liverpool when playing FIFA 10.
The Wall

It doesn’t matter the format, Spain will go all the way. The #9 rank couldn’t even beat Catalonia(a region of Spain).
Bird

in true bracket form, I got a 5-12 upset, with Japan over Germany on the first day, who would then get owned by england. In any event Mexico looking good right now, and I would look forward to Mexico vs Argentina.
romaromaroma

Just seeing Italy vs. South Korea makes me feel sick.

Ugh.
http://scotland.worldcupblog.org Ian

roma – I would think Italy fans would want that game most of all. As Khan said, Revenge is a dish best served cold, and it’s very cold in South Africa … oh … I guess that doesn’t work.
Tom

Denmark-France and Cameroon-Uruguay would be crackers.

Who could forget Uruguay’s last world cup finals game against Senegal?

Also Italy-South Korea would be interesting considering their last world cup meeting.
Darren

I dunno, if you want a true March Madness bracket, wouldn’t you need two #1 seeds? That would make Brazil a number #1, and the Netherlands would be a #2 in the same bracket as Spain, and Italy would be a #2 in the Brazil bracket, etc…

Would change this quite drasticlly!
Lee

lol @ bracket.

Well played, sir.
Ricardo

Australia would be a fun game for mexico, but the challenge and chance for revenge would come in the second round for mexico. Indeed as I see Argentina as of now mexico could pull off the upset and win….
http://www.blogofsport.info Blog Of Sport

Well, we can’t blame him for not being able to go to World Cup as the first Englishman who come to WC for the third time, he has done enough. Now that we must worried about if he can back to play soccer again or not.
http://scotland.worldcupblog.org Ian

BOS – I believe two other Englishmen have three WC appearances each. Still, your point is taken – he has given plenty to his national team.
http://www.worldcupblog.org Daryl

Blog of Sport,

Can I assume your comment was intended for this post:
http://www.worldcupblog.org/world-cup-2010/david-beckham-out-of-world-cup-2010-will-you-miss-him.html
Jon

I wanted England to get revenge against Portugal but England and France for the finals would be crazy!
Bashar

This is an interesting game to play. Would be cool to see this happen in the Europa League for example with UEFA coefficients determining seedings.

Although not sure how well it would work. I think the Italian cup do something like this.

That does not take into account is that (if this were a reality) the hosts would be one of the top seeds if not the #1. So South Africa would play North Korea.
Brad

This is an excellent site, but the format for the March Madness style bracket is BADLY BUTCHERED. If you advance the top seeds past the first round, then you SHOULD have:

1-16, 8-9, 4-13, 5-12, 2-15, 7-10, 3-14, 6-11
(In other words, the sum of all the second round match-ups of higher seeds would be 17)

Instead, you have potential higher-seed match-ups like #5 Germany-#8 England & #6 Portugal-#7 France. And you also have potential games like a #14-#10 match-up!!! That’s insane. The first two games combined have almost the same total number as the #14-#10 game (26 vs. 24).

Here is what the TOURNAMENT SHOULD LOOK LIKE IF THE FORMAT IS PROPERLY APPLIED:

1 Spain
32 N Korea

16 Uruguay
17 Cameroon

8 England
25 Algeria

9 Argentina
24 Slovakia

4 Italy
29 S Korea

13 Mexico
20 Australia

5 Germany
28 Japan

12 Chile
21 Slovenia

2 Brazil
31 S Africa

15 USA
18 Nigeria

7 France
26 Denmark

10 Greece
23 Paraguay

3 Netherlands
30 New Zealand

14 Switzerland
19 Cote d’Ivoire

6 Portugal
27 Honduras

11 Serbia
22 Ghana
Bruno

I agree with Brad. His format makes much more sense.
http://www.worldcupblog.org Daryl

For the record, the bracket was created using this:
http://exceltemplates.net/sports/tournament-bracket/
Which I assumed did things correctly.

Not disagreeing with you though Brad, it definitely seems odd that we could have #6 vs #7 in second round and so on.
Brad

The bracket is DEFINITELY wrong. If you advance the top seeds all the way it should look like this:

Round of 16:

1-16, 8-9, 4-13, 5-12, 2-15, 7-10, 3-14, 6-11

Quarterfinals:

1-8, 4-5, 2-7, 3-6

Semifinals

1-4, 2-3

Finals

1-2

Notice how each time the highest seed plays the lowest seed (when advancing the highest seeds each round). An easy way to check to see if you designed a bracket properly is to count the total seeds in a particular game. Notice how in the round of 16 it always adds up to 17 (when advancing higher seeds). It’s also 9 total for the quarterfinals, 5 total for the semifinals, etc..

Just look at any bracket from an ACTUAL NCAA tournament. A #6 vs #7 match-up is IMPOSSIBLE that early in the tournament.

I know what I am talking about.
Brad

I’m sorry if my comments here come off as strident. I enjoy the site and your accent, Daryl. It just makes me cringe to look at this thing. Surely, you understand.

Warm regards,
Brad
http://www.worldcupblog.org Daryl

Brad,

No worries, and if you look above you’ll see I’v reworked the bracket into a proper NCAA format.
http://bolaliar.com/ Bola

Glad that you shared this! It’s some pretty great info, I know some people that will really enjoy this.
Thank you and My best regards!
Bola