Re: Is 2007 WC the most boring world event ever in any sport?

On May 1, 6:37 pm, a...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx (Dr A. N. Walker) wrote:
In article <1178036738.785834.259...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>,
Gavin Cawley <g...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

The main problem would be that the venues and maches for a given team
wouldn't be known in advance, [...]
Yet no-one bothered about this for the last three [and most
important!] matches of the current WC; [...]
The same would be true for the Swiss if used to select the semi-
finalists, but you would also have more uncertainty in the previous
rounds than in the current set up. [...]

Slightly. [The "Super 8" matches are also unknown at the
start of the tournament, tho' admittedly they're fixed once the
groups are over.] Against that, you have the certainty of knowing
that "your" team will still be "in" by round 4 -- I'd guess that
this time around a fair number of India/Pakistan supporters had
to arrange, and Ireland/Bangladesh supporters to cancel, flights
home at short notice.

True. To be honest, my favoured scheme would be a double round robin
with each team having the choice of batting or bowling first once in
each pairing. The games to be played in parallel as far as possible
(i'm sure that they could be scheduled to make sure the TV coverage of
the games with the greatest expected audience overlapped as little as
possible). IMHO this would give the best chance of the best team
winning and would be easier to understand than the Swiss scheme.

Problem solved ....
Not so much solved as delegated ;-)
Still not as good as keeping the current structure

You mis-spelled "IMHO" as " "!

I'm not RH, so there is at least an implied IMHO in anything for which
I can't provide a proof! ;-)

Having said which, I did go on to write "(which is fine in my
opinion...)", so it was labelled if indirectly as opinion.

[...] I can see how the Swiss system would appeal
in chess,

Indeed, but it *should* appeal in any situation where you
have (a) too many teams for all-play-all, and/or (b) too great a
disparity in strength for an a-p-a to be "interesting", and (c)
too big a commitment for a simple KO to be acceptable.

Yes, but I don't agree that there are too many teams for all-play-all,
this is only true if you want to play them essentially sequentially,
which I don't think is neccesary (especially in the current era of
huge-number-of-channels-but-nothing-worth-watching TV). Also, even if
the minnows versus sharks games are not interesting from a spectator
point of view, they serve a useful purpose in the development of the
minnows, so you could always just not show them on TV?

but it doesn't seem worth the effort in cricket from the
point of view of the spectators attending on the day (not that they
were greatly apparent this time).

I'm not clear what "effort" you think is involved.

Mostly on the part of the travel agents (and therefore cost), but
there is also the point that a cricketing world that thinks Duckworth-
Lewis is too complex, and questions its value, I'm not sure the
inherent fairness of the Swiss system would be readily aparent (unlike
the round-robin).

You've
decided to fly to [eg] Oz to watch cricket for five weeks or so,
you have a package that gets you the tickets and flights for "your"
team, so every few days you fly off to Brisbane [or wherever] for
a day or three. Why is it significantly worse, from your POV,
than knowing before you fly to Oz that *if* your team finishes
second in its group *then* you have to fly to Brisbane on day X
[whereas otherwise it might be Hobart or nowhere]?

True, it is not that much more complicated, but I'm not sure that the
benefits outweigh the cost, largely because I seem to have different
views on the underlying issues (happy with parallel games, happy with
mismatches).

Meanwhile, note that a Swiss greatly reduces the number of
gross mismatches [should happen only in round 1!], and enables you
to turn the event into a major "carnival" of cricket [or chess or
whatever]. We could have 40 or 100 teams there if we liked, with
no major effect on what happened to the top teams [assuming some
"acceleration" and seeding to (eg) round 3, or perhaps "Open",
"Major" and "Minor" sections as in most chess tournaments]. The
"luck of the draw" also adds a frisson of excitement to the admin
in later stages, just as it does to the FA Cup [but not Wimbledon].

Having even more minnows involved would indeed be a benefit of the
system (especially if it annoys RH).

But as you say, there are other ways of organizing the tournament in a
more imaginative method, and it seems a shame that the ICC did such a
poor job of WC 2007.

Yes. TBH, I think the Davis Cup model is probably a more
likely route. Gives us a scaled-down but more exciting/relevant
WC every year, and could replace all these meaningless series
being played. Eg, based on this year's WC, we could have next
year a D1 of Oz, SA, SL and NZ, D2 of Eng, WI, Bangla and Ireland,
D3 of India, Pak, Zim, ??[Kenya?], D4 ..., D5 ...., ... D10 ...,
with one team promoted/relegated each year from each division.
Should all be quite exciting and "meaningful".

I would find the ODI series more interesting if they were arranged as
a formal league, be happy to dispense with the WC for that. However
I'll always be happy to wait for the tests for exciting and meaningful
cricket ;-) - except I don't have $ky to watch it on :-(

.

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