This past Saturday in Brasilia, the Netherlands defeated Brazil in the third place playoff at the World Cup. Although the players were 468 miles away from where they wanted to be — in Rio de Janeiro for the final — they undoubtedly felt worlds away.
As is usually the case with these games that closely resemble exhibition games, the players and coaches had no interest in the match. There are exceptions to this, such as in 1994 when a fired up Swedish team easily defeated Bulgaria 4-0. But lets face it, Brazil, the country that has won more World Cups than any other country and paid millions of dollars to win a title on its home soil, and the Netherlands, who yet again came close to winning its first World Cup but fell short, had zero interest in 90 more minutes of football.
If you don’t believe me, just listen to Dutch coach Louis Van Gaal, who is eager to get started coaching Manchester United and Dutch player Arjen Robben. “I think this match should never be played,” Van Gaal said. He went on to say, “After a tournament in which you’ve played so marvelously well, you go home as a loser just because you’ve lost the last two matches. This has got nothing whatsoever to do with sport.”
Robben was equally unexcited for the opportunity to claim third, “They can keep it. Only one prize counts and that is becoming world champion.”
The only thing in common between Brazil’s humiliating 7-1 loss to Germany and the Netherlands’ crushing Penalty Kick shootout defeat by Argentina was the aftermath. Players on both sides were crying and probably wanted to think about anything other than soccer.
The men’s basketball NCAA Tournament did away with its consolation game, and so did the NFL. The Euro Cup no longer has one. So why is FIFA so insistent in having this game? Many will tell you that it is tradition. But let’s not forget that FIFA really is just a business.
The third place play-off is one last marketing opportunity for FIFA. According to Soccernomics, a book written by Simon Kuper and Stefan Szymanski, the Third Place Play-off gives a 4.9% boost to the World Cup’s television ratings. That is obviously hard to resist for FIFA.
George Black of the New Yorker magazine recently penned an article titled “The Third-Place Game Is Often The Best Game.” He cites that the games are more close and exciting than the finals.
The problems with Black’s comments are obvious. A close game does not mean a better game if less is on the line. Most teams and their fans do not care about the match, so it may be closer statistically, but the excitement is taken away because they are playing for a meaningless prize.
FIFA constantly attempts to remind its fans that everything it does is for the better of the game. If that were true, it would get rid of a game that the players and coaches express every four years they have no interest in playing. Players can get injured and miss time with their club teams, and are less rested as well.
Right after the Dutch finished off Brazil Saturday, one look at the players involved in the game told the story. The Dutch players who had just won had smiles, but no excitement. Sure they were happy they had won, but most would have been happier had they been spending to be with their families regrouping for club action. Meanwhile, the Brazilian players were humiliated. As Van Gaal said, nobody should lose two games in a row after such a great tournament. Brazil’s awful ending to their country’s World Cup was now much worse.
This game needs to go and it needs to go now.
