WJC: Bring back the bye to semifinals for the group winners!

[New User Name]

You want fair?

Both groups are combined for the playoffs by points. Results of head to head games count as tiebreaker, if the 2 teams did not play each other in the preliminaries, then goal differential is the tie breaker.

For this year the standings would be

Canada 12 points +17
Sweden 12 points +12
USA 8 points +8
Slovakia 6 points -7
Czech Republic 5 points -2
Russia 5 points +4
Finland 4 points -3
Denmark 4 points -5

Using the fair system of best vs worst (1st vs 8th, 2nd vs 7th etc) you then have quarterfinals of

Canada vs Denmark
Sweden vs Finland
USA vs Russia
Slovakia vs Czech Republic

Let's say the top 4 teams advance, which is Canada, Sweden, USA and Slovakia and you stay with best vs worst, you have

Canada vs Slovakia and Sweden vs USA.

NOW ISN'T THAT STRANGE THAT IT ALL WORKS OUT THE EXACT WAY IT IS THIS YEAR AND THE ONLY FAIR WAY!!

Why are you complaining if it's fairness you're looking for?

 

[Davebo*]

The problem is Canada has free pass to final. But Sweden, the other group winner, needs to play against worst possible oppnents. Right now it feels Canada has a bye to final with the opponents they have. How is that fair??? Should the WJC be decided with luck???

Have you seen Canada's results at this tournament lately? Serious - go look them up.

Now - having seen those results - now do you understand why we're in the group we are??? I expect you will obstinately refuse to see any logic, and will continue your tirade of unfairness.

 

[Davebo*]

This is definitely one of the reasons for the switch back to this format.

I prefer it the way it is now. The bye means one less game to watch - how's that good?

 

[ATBLeafsTyler]

You want fair?

Both groups are combined for the playoffs by points. Results of head to head games count as tiebreaker, if the 2 teams did not play each other in the preliminaries, then goal differential is the tie breaker.

For this year the standings would be

Canada 12 points +17
Sweden 12 points +12
USA 8 points +8
Slovakia 6 points -7
Czech Republic 5 points -2
Russia 5 points +4
Finland 4 points -3
Denmark 4 points -5

Using the fair system of best vs worst (1st vs 8th, 2nd vs 7th etc) you then have quarterfinals of

Canada vs Denmark
Sweden vs Finland
USA vs Russia
Slovakia vs Czech Republic

Let's say the top 4 teams advance, which is Canada, Sweden, USA and Slovakia and you stay with best vs worst, you have

Canada vs Slovakia and Sweden vs USA.

NOW ISN'T THAT STRANGE THAT IT ALL WORKS OUT THE EXACT WAY IT IS THIS YEAR AND THE ONLY FAIR WAY!!

Why are you complaining if it's fairness you're looking for?

Wow, good idea pulling up those stats. Let's look at last year.

Sweden 12 pts +15
Canada 10 pts +7
USA 9 pts +14
Finland 7 pts +4
Russia 6 pts +13
Czech Republic 5 pts -4
Switzerland 5 pts -6
Slovakia 3 pts 0

So the match-ups:

Sweden vs. Slovakia
Canada vs. Switzerland
Czech Republic vs. USA
Finland vs. Russia

Bolded ones are correct. So far when it comes to top two vs. bottom two, there have been no discrepancies. Obviously the system can't be perfect though and you will have anomalies, more likely in the middle.

 

[Scotty B]

Russia was completely disinterested in the game against the Czech Republic, the same team Sweden beat convincingly. The Russian team is the only team from group B that I wouldn't want to face in the QF's. So, all things considered, facing Finland isn't the worst outcome. However, Finland usually get their scoring going in the later stages and with that goalie tandem, I'm not overly confident. They always seem to be able to get a 100% out of their team against Sweden.
Canada is the team to beat this tourney. That's fairly obvious at this point. They've earned an easier path to the finals and it's on home ground.

Seems like Czechs really upped their play, from the Denmark game onward; they seem to be playing a more direct North South KISS ( Keep it Simple Stupid ) style now, driving hard to the net, chipping and chasing, parking a guy in front of the nettie... yadda yadda...rather than that more Euro-fied East-West perimeter game that wasn't working earlier.

As for the Russians...why would they tank vs Czechs? Surely, they'd much rather be facing SVK in QF's, as opposed to dem Damn Yankees?

 

[helicecopter]

The only fact is that Slovakia won.

Nope, lol

 

[helicecopter]

Finland dominated the game in terms of controlling the puck for sure. However they scored less goals and therefore managed to lose and deserved to finish 4th. And Finland has been pretty bad in terms of scoring goals all preliminary round, technically even worse than Slovakia, who at least managed to score 5 goals against the Germans.

Denmark got similarly dominated by both the Czechs and the Swiss in their respective games, yet they walked away with points from both games.

You seem to suggest that the team who dominates a game in terms of puck posession and shots is automaically a better team who deserves better results.

i'm sorry i gave you that impression, that is not what i was trying to say.
Slovakia legitimately scored more goals and fairly won the game as a result.
What I am saying is that it is pretty obvious to anyone unbiased who watched that game (and the others) which is the better team no matter which team scored more goals in that particular game.
Sweden would have had an easier quarter vs the Slovaks than the Finns, hopefully that doesn't offend you.

And the whole point was not about fairness by the way, but about making winning the preliminary groups relevant instead of pretty much pointless, which makes the preliminary rounds less interesting than before for the top few teams in particular.

 

[PanniniClaus]

I prefer it the way it is now. The bye means one less game to watch - how's that good?

If you read my countless other posts on this topic you will find my arguments for the current format. I am not foolish enough to think money is not a consideration.

 

[Slimmy]

And again, it's one instance where being worse was actually better and it is almost ten years old. How many tournaments were played since then? If you keep bringing this one situation, it just shows, how rare it actually is.
The system isn't flawed. If there's actually a "flaw" then it lies in sport itself, because it just so happens, that not everything goes as expected and sometimes, a good team on paper just doesn't perform as well as he should be.
Oh and I didn't find a single solution which I would actually call an improvement in this thread. Advancing right to the semifinals just gives the group winners unnecessarily big advantage - I mean they're already one of the best teams and they even get a chance to rest, while they get to play tired opponent who is probably weaker - that just make the competition even more uneven. Lottery is simply stupid, because it just makes the round robin stage absolutely meaningles and the idea with choosing your opponent is even more ridiculous and has so many logical holes (which group winner will pick first? If the group winner from one group chooses the group winner from the other group, while the other group winner wants to play with someone else, will they throw a coin or someting? and so on...) that I don't even want to call it plausible and I didn't see any other idea ...

I have no idea how rare it is, but I proved it does occur and that it could potentially have been an issue in games in this tournament. Even if it wouldn't be a factor you should still see some sort of advantage in winning the group. As to the idea of choosing your opponent, it's real simple; winner of group A would have the option to choose from the two lowest seeded teams in group B who have advanced to the QF's, i.e 3 and 4. The winner from group B would get to choose from the two lowest seeded teams in group A. Is it perfect? No, but it's an improvement.

 

[Atas2000]

Sweden won the group B. But is it any favour of that??? We is in the thoughest bracket in the elemination games.

I think it should be a favour to win the group. But is it???

I think canadians feels good about this but shouldn't the other group winner get any favour too??

I want the bye to semifinals back. Or maybe the winners should get the opportunity to choose opponent in QF.

I have faith in my team. It's not about that. But I want rules that make the top team's to want win not thinking it's better to lose.

What's your thoughts

worst BS ever. you play the same amount of games as everybody. if you are not good enough to beat Finland you have no place in the semis. period.

 

[TheTwelfth]

Sweden has a pretty good recent track record against Finland, and the matchup is always awesome. The current system is much more fair than any first round bye ever could be.

 

[Rocko604]

I liked it because it gave incentive to finish 1st in your group. This made the New Years Eve games even more entertaining because it usually guaranteed a team from each group would be playing for a medal.

Canada beating the US may have given them Denmark instead of Russia, but looking at it the other way, Sweden would much rather play Slovakia than Finland.

The 8 team QF also means that the tournament has to be held in two NHL cities when hosted in Canada from now on in order to have all the QF games played in one day and get max revenue.

 

[aphyro]

There's no fairness and why should there be? If you want to win the gold medal, you should be able to beat anyone and not be looking for an easy route to the final! (hint: Sweden 2006 OG )

Wow keep tell yourself that 2006 was a dodge from the Swedes...

But I agree if you wanna be the best you gotta take out the best no doubts!

 

[Auston Marlander]

Lol let's not over do it with the whole travel thing. Montreal to Toronto is literally ilke a 2 hour flight, 2 1/2 hours max. It's not like these guys are going from Ufa to Moscow. Travel shouldn't be any disadvantage to a team, and if it is then to me that's just flat out excuses for poor play. "Had to fly there with little amount of sleep" Finland probably has a charter flight or a red eye waiting for them. And by the time they got to sleep on the plane they'd be landing in Toronto.

The flight is 1 hour and 15 minutes. It takes longer to drive across Toronto in rush hour

 

[helgo]

it's real simple; winner of group A would have the option to choose from the two lowest seeded teams in group B who have advanced to the QF's, i.e 3 and 4. The winner from group B would get to choose from the two lowest seeded teams in group A. Is it perfect? No, but it's an improvement.

To be honest, this is plausible and it is something, I wouldn't be absolutely opposed to, but that being said, about it being an improvement, we'll just have to agree to disagree.

First, I just don't really like the whole aspect of "choosing you own opponent", yeah maybe few teams did it in the past, but your solution is basically to prevent that with making it an official part of the sport competition, which I don't really see as an improvement.

I understand your point about this system being more advantageous to the group winner and it could probably lead to more interesting group stage but on the other hand, does the group winner really need bigger advantage? And what about the elimination stage?

With the current system it's pretty clear - if you're the best team you earn the right to play against the worst team and in the same way, if you're the worst (of advancing teams) then you deserve to play against one of the group winners. It goes both ways. So in that regard, does it really sound fair for team like Slovakia, to play against Sweden, even though they beat Finland and thus also earned a chance to play against lesser quality opponent? And the other thing, I consider a coincidence to be part of sport and even if it's not favourable for Sweden, for average viewer, this is pretty interesting matchup. And with the "choosing" system, these types of matchups between group winners x underachieving top countries simply wouldn't be possible because the group winners would always choose overachieving underdogs rather than them.

 

[Kharkov]

When Lollipop sees why Finland is 4th in their group he understands that this is fair to Sweden. Not expecting that they miraculously improve their game so much that they could defeat Sweden.

 

[OttawaRoughRiderFan*]

Not going to happen. The TV ratings for ALL 4 quarterfinal games will be huge. The extra ticket revenue will be substantial and we will not see a return of a bye to the semis.

 

[aphyro]

Serriously this thread make the swedes looks like *****s

We gonna slay that finnish lion once and for all

 

[Mestaruus]

Serriously this thread make the swedes looks like *****s

We gonna slay that finnish lion once and for all

Yes it does. It just makes me think that some Swedes fear Finland in this tournament. Have to say I like that.

 

[Canuck21t]

Lol, people said the same last year. Who won the gold? Right Finland.

If you can't win over Finland, then you don't deserve the gold. It's that simple.

This is not really about luck. You lead the group, you get to play against the 4th ranked of the other group. What's the point of playing any game if all you're going to do is based on paper? With your logic, let's award the gold to the favourite on paper and end the tournament already .

You're also being very arrogant towards teams like Slovakia who have earned their position.

 

[Healthy DiPietro]

Not being cocky or anything - Finland is a good team and they can definitely beat Sweden - but going by preliminary results Finland is the best opponent for us. I would rather play a team that has lost 3 out of 4 games (Finland) than a team that has lost 2 out of 4 (Slovakia).

 

[llwyd]

Not being cocky or anything - Finland is a good team and they can definitely beat Sweden - but going by preliminary results Finland is the best opponent for us. I would rather play a team that has lost 3 out of 4 games (Finland) than a team that has lost 2 out of 4 (Slovakia).

Well, honestly, were I a Swede and would objectively look at those matches in our group, I would absolutely, without a moment's hesitation choose Slovakia. Yeah, Finland has had ridiculously bad finishing, but often there is this ketchup bottle effect, things tend to even out (even though it's true that scoring is a perennial Finnish problem).

So, Finland was really competitive in those matches against tough opponents and dominated both Slovakia and Germany, they have two great goalies and a special rivalry against Sweden (that can turn out in surprising ways, good and bad). Slovakia would be really much, much more predictable and easier to handle opponent to Sweden even though it beat Finland and finished third.

Just my personal opinion, of course, and plenty of people seem to disagree.

 

[Canuck21t]

not really. The Finns were easily better than the Slovaks when they played them.

Ok, so not let's forget the score and just look at how the game is played. Let's use judged to determine which teams deserves more no matter who scored more.

 

[lamini]

As to the idea of choosing your opponent, it's real simple; winner of group A would have the option to choose from the two lowest seeded teams in group B who have advanced to the QF's, i.e 3 and 4. The winner from group B would get to choose from the two lowest seeded teams in group A. Is it perfect? No, but it's an improvement.

That would make round robin games even less important, with exception of 1v2 and 4v5. After 2 losses to 1, they have no incentive to bother with other games, since even if they finish 4th there's no risk of them playing 1st, they'll always play second easiest team remaining. And 4th has incentive only in game against 5th, since they'd play 1st in QF even if they defeat 2nd or 3rd.

Edit: also about Russia being disinterrested in game against Cze...so games where team that's better on paper played below what's expected shouldn't count? should this game be replayed? who would judge that team played up to its potential or that the game shouldn't count?

 

[llwyd]

Ok, so not let's forget the score and just look at how the game is played. Let's use judged to determine which teams deserves more no matter who scored more.

Of course it was a just result and Slovakia beat Finland fair and square. But sometimes "steals" do happen: the other side dominates, gets plenty more good scoring chances, controls the game and the pace, but just can't score to save their lives and the opponent punishes from the few chances they get.

In a series the dominant team would probably easily win but in a single game, steals do happen - and I'm not saying that it's not fair or undeserved, the opposite in fact, but single games are not always exact when measuring the strengths of the two sides...