How is that again, Mr. Blatter?

Sepp Blatter's statement about the 2010 qualifying setup, "We didn't change anything," is a perfect example of the sort of bureaucratic double-speak that we've come to expect from politicians the world over (Blatter Starts Re-Election Campaign) . And as with just about all of the other purveyors of the "art": what is said bears a 180 degree variance from reality. What the FIFA Executive Committee did was cemented the results of the 2006 qualifying campaign, but the qualifying campaign itself is by no means the same setup.

In 2006 CONCACAF had 3 1/2 places with the 4th place finisher having a playoff against the 5th place Asian team, while Oceania's winner had a playoff against the 5th place South American team. As we all now know, Australia beat Uruguay in a home-and-home series to go to Germany, and Trinidad and Tobago joined them after its playoff vs. Bahrain.

That gives us the same confederation numbers that Sepp quoted: 8 qualifiers across the Americas, and 5 Asian and Oceania teams. But in 2006 there was another alternative result of the playoffs: 9 teams from the Americas and 4 teams from Asia/Oceania could have been brushing up on their Faust. So in effect what FIFA has said is that either the 4th place CONCACAF or 5th place CONMEBOL team is worse than the 5th place Asian team or the best Oceania team.

At first blush that looks like Australia is just going to not get screwed finally after all those years of fruitless playoff, having to beat Bahrain instead of Uruguay now. But what it actually means is that both Australia and New Zealand could conceivably qualify for 2010.

How is that? Australia moved to the Asian Federation as of January 1 of this year, which means that is where they will be for the 2010 world cup qualification. So what is actually happening is that with New Zealand almost guaranteed to win Oceania, and I'd be surprised if Australia wound up finishing 5th in Asia if the last World Cup performances of Asian teams is anything to go by, the bottom of those federations will be New Zealand, the Saudis or Bahrain.

In the last World Cup, only Australia advanced to the knockout stages from the far side of the world, while Brazil, Ecuador, Mexico and Argentina went through from our side.

In 2002 Japan and Korea were co-hosts, and both advanced, but their co-federationists Saudi Arabia went 0-3 with 0 goals scored, and 12 against, while China finished with the same results but only 9 goals against. Our side saw Brazil, Paraguay, Mexico and the US advance.

Going back one more tournament and you see ACF/Oceania getting shut out again: Saudis 0-1-5 with minus 5 goal difference (GD); South Korea 0-1-2 with minus 7 GD; Iran came closest with 1-0-2 and a minus 2 GD, though that 1 win was against a Steve Sampson-led US team; and Japan wound up with an 0-0-3 and a minus 3. The Americas had Paraguay, Mexico, Brazil, Chile, and Argentina go through.

So you basically have two federations that have only ever been able to qualify for the knockout stages the one time they hosted the games being rewarded with an extra spot, and the two federations that regularly see half of their qualifiers make it through to the knockouts losing 1.

How does that logic work again, Mr. Blatter?