France cry foul as England are given seeding for WC draw
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France cry foul as England are given seeding for World Cup draw
As if the threatened suspension of Thierry Henry were not enough, France narrowly lost out to England yesterday for a place among the seeds at tomorrow’s World Cup draw, claiming that they were being punished for the Barcelona forward’s indiscretion against Ireland in the qualification play-off.
England were, as expected, confirmed as one of the eight seeds after a meeting of the World Cup organising committee yesterday — meaning that they will avoid being drawn against the true heavyweights, such as Brazil and Spain, although a worst-case scenario would still involve them being drawn in the same group as France, Ivory Coast and the United States. But the process used to reach that decision, which was based on positions in the Fifa world rankings in October, has left a sour taste in France.
Henry learnt last night that he was facing a Fifa disciplinary investigation for his deliberate handball in Paris last month, which led to the goal by William Gallas that eliminated Ireland, and the French delegation in Cape Town suspect that the incident played on the minds of the World Cup organising committee as it settled on its seedings yesterday.
Speaking on RTL, the French radio station, Michel Hidalgo, the coach who led Les Bleus to victory at the European Championship in 1984, said: “At the highest level of football, there has to be comprehensive moral justice — and I don’t know why France isn’t a top seed. There are sporting regulations that have not been applied by Fifa. These are exorbitant charges. France were world champions in 1998 and runners-up in 2006. Who made Argentina top seeds? What have England done, apart from having a league full of foreign players?
“I am asking myself if this is not a sanction for the handball of Henry. It is an injustice. It’s not for me to point a finger, but it does seem like France is being sanctioned.”
Jérôme Valcke, the Fifa general secretary and a Frenchman, rejected those allegations. “The October rankings were used because otherwise it would have given an unfair advantage to the teams who played in the play-offs [because they played an extra two competitive matches, which hold more weight in the rankings table],” he said. “Why, then, should they play more matches and get more points? Why should we kick out England, who had a very nice qualifying campaign?”
Fabio Capello, the England manager, will certainly be grateful that his team did not miss out. While they would have been seeded using the same criteria as at the 2002 and 2006 finals — where rankings were used, along with performance at previous tournaments — there had been fears that a change in policy was likely to take into account rankings over the previous two-year period. This would have meant England losing out to France, having fallen to fourteenth in the rankings after their failure to qualify for the European Championship finals in 2008.
Jean-Pierre Escalettes, president of the French football federation, was more diplomatic. “There’s no surprise,” he said. “I had done my calculations and we only had a very small chance of figuring in the first pot. It was logical that Fifa would use the October rankings, which placed us in ninth position. The handball of Thierry Henry cannot have come into consideration.”
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stupid... I hope they kena Brazil or Spain.
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france have no right to say anything after the way they cheated ireland.
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They are now just trying to play victim.
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the best for them, France, Spain, Ivory Coast, and USA..
see how they die..
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They already had to go into the playoffs.
In the playoffs, they had to depend on a double handball to qualify.
After all that, they still expected to be seeded?
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France too lucky to be in the finals...
now lady luck not with them anymore..
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even if kana punish, wrong meh?
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serves u right france for playing dirty
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Had alotta respect for France back when Zidane was still around..but now i really hope they go out in the 1st round of next year's World Cup!
Hope they end up in a Group of Death..France..Pui!!
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as usual what.. french are jokers what
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PUI
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bojor~!!!!!!!!!!!!
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henry that fucker deserves it la
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What's the problem?
The top 2 from each group will advance to the next round.
Even if you lose to the seeded team in the group, you still can qualify by beating the other 2 teams.
Why so afraid?
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*boos at e French
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France got too good a draw. Its like they are the Group A seeded team afterall...
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Hope France goes on and win the world cup. I just love to be against everyone.:)
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Originally posted by zocoss:
France got too good a draw. Its like they are the Group A seeded team afterall...
They tio Mexico, South Africa, and Uruguay.
So, yeah, it's almost as though they got seeded after all. The other three teams are not very serious opposition, methinks.
If they still KPKB over this matter, then I've got nothing nice to say about them.