The Ballon d'Or - does it matter?

Congrats to Ronaldo on winning the Ballon d'Or, but does it really matter?

How do you define who is the best player in the world? And isn't this the stuff that we all enjoy discussing in the bar, before a game, or usually when you're bored at work.

Ronaldo, Messi, Ribery, Rory Delap, Micheal Bradley - it all depends who you ask. Although I doubt anyone has ever answered Ribery!

Individual awards are never definitive as it's a team game, but Ronaldo deserves to be praised as one of the best of his generation. He's taken the game to a new level, and comparing him to Messi and (to some extent) Zlatan is always a fun discussion.

It's not a video game, you can like all the best players in the world - the trophy will cement Cristiano's place with the greats, but he didn't need an award for that.

There can only be one....or 4 of 8

FIFA posted the 4 games that will decide the final European qualifiers for next summer in Brazil.

With 9 places taken, the winners over two legs will take Europe's contingent up to 13.

According to the FIFA website...

Portugal - Sweden
Ukraine - France
Greece - Romania
Iceland - Croatia

Portugal (ranked 14), Greece (15), Croatia (18) and Ukraine (20) were the seeded teams while France(21), Sweden (25), Romania (29) and Iceland (46) were unseeded, based on the FIFA/Coca-Cola World Ranking of 17 October 2013.

The home-and-away play-off matches are due to be played on 15 November and 19 November respectively.

So, who do you fancy?

I'm taking Zlatan over Cristiano. Why? I don't know, I just think Zlatan knows it's probably his last World Cup, loves it when someone has an ego to match his, and would really enjoy sticking it to Sepp Blatter and FIFA. He knows they want/need Ronaldo at the World Cup. He's such an icon of the modern game and attracts so much interest. I'd like to see both teams go, but that's the beauty of it - it's like Highlander - there can only be 1....or 4 of 8, just doesn't sound as good!

France have the quality to beat Ukraine, but I worry about them. They are so inconsistent, but Didier Deschamps has got his team together a little and playing well. Ukraine are ok, but I don't see them winning away if they need to.

Greece against Romania is probably the lease exciting tie, but I fancy Greece, even with Gerogios Samaras in the team. 

And then there's Iceland. I don't think there's a neutral out there who doesn't want them to make their first big tournament - and it has nothing to do with Croatia. I'd like to see Eidur Gudjohnsen get there - mainly because he used to play for the national team with his Dad, and has great goal celebrations.   

It's about time CONCACAF made a change

There are lots of relieved people in Mexico this morning. Thanks to some late goals for the US against Panama, Mexico still have a chance to make it to Brazil next summer.

The Mexican drama has been like one of their infamous soap operas. An overhead kick with 5 mins to go to beat Panama, an unbelievable miss by Chicharito, followed by a Graham Zuzi header for the US in stoppage time to give the Mexicans a lifeline after they lost away in Costa Rica.

Mexico have always qualified when the competition was held in the Americas (1930, 50, 62, 70, 78, 86 and 94), and no doubt will have a good following if they beat New Zealand in two-leg playoff in November.

But surely it's now time that the CONCACAF region made a change in how teams qualify - or maybe FIFA need to look at taking one of the 3 automatic places away - or at least ditch the Intercontinental playoff game.

Mexico finished 4th in a group of 6, only won 2 games, scoring just 7 goals. This is undoubtedly one of the weakest Mexican teams in recent memory - they are so bad that they can't even rough teams up like they used to.

They finished behind the US, Costa Rica and Honduras - the latter two of which are highly unlikely to make it out of the group stages in Brazil. So why should Mexico get yet another chance to go? They have been very poor and don't deserve to be at the main event. The US have a decent team, but not one you would say is going to genuinely contend at the World Cup. Jurgen Klinsmann has done a very good job, and the US have completely dominated the region, but they really should - beating teams like Antigua & Barbuda, Guatemala and Jamaica should be pretty straightforward. But you can only beat the teams put in front of you.

And Mexico couldn't.

New Zealand won 6 of 6 in their region, but they should too - Tahiti and New Caledonia aren't much of a test either.

Maybe FIFA needs to revamp the qualifying process as it seems like they want some of the same teams there at every World Cup. With the current system, the US are pretty much guaranteed to be in, and it seems Mexico are being given more chances than most to also be there.

Balotelli not helping the game with theatrics

Watching Mario Balotelli is frustrating, enjoyable, infuriating, a train wreck, fantastic and annoying at at once.

An amazing talent, there's no denying that.

A nutcase, genius specimen of a baby is kinda how I would describe him.

He can do it all, but then you see him do what he did against Ajax yesterday to deny them a point in the 93rd minute. He fouls the defender, yet cons the referee into giving Milan a penalty (which he scores himself).

Cut it out Mario. Or maybe UEFA/FIFA should actually tell those officials behind the goal to do something!

Geezer of the Day

I saw Iraq were playing Chile today and wondered who would be watching that - it's by no means a glamour friendly, but it's great to see that football is back and booming in Iraq.

(UPDATE: Iraq lost 6-0 to Chile in Brondby, Denmark.)

FIFA says there are 110 clubs in the country, with over half a million players. They have just slipped out of the world's top 100, and only qualified for 1 World Cup (1986), but they did really well at the recent U20s tournament and it seems like football is a real tool for helping rebuild.

So today's Geezer is Hussein Saeed - he scored 61 goals in 126 games for his country (both records) and represented Iraq at 3 Olympic games in the 1980s.

*Apologies as I don't know if it's Said or Saeed.

Pelotas' look ahead to Wednesday tilts

Tio Pelotas provides a small glimpse of what's to come on a fun FIFA friendly day

So it's friendly-match day. Some of us don't care because they're just that---friendlies--while others do because it's more football in the middle of August. With summer winding down here in the States, school about to start and, oh yeah, World Cup qualifiers, major European campaigns and MLS playoffs nearing, let's look at some of the matches on tap for tomorrow:

South Korea-Peru (5am) - South Korea went to the World Cup semifinals in 2002; Peru went to the World Cup in 1982. This has 0-0 written all over it.

Chile-Iraq (noon) - Iraq is rebuilding and will face the wrath of Chile's attack. Chile reportedly will play Iran in its next friendly. No word or confirmation if North Korea is on tap as well.

Colombia-Serbia (2pm) - Radamel Falcao is rich, good-looking, scored on his Ligue 1 debut over the weekend, just became a dad and his side is close to a World Cup ticket, its first in more than 15 years. Now he's the most interesting man in the world.

Bosnia-USA (2:30pm) - Clint Dempsey is big news in the US but won't be in Bosnia for this friendly. No problem. Maybe. OK, crap, 'merica may be in trouble. Bosnia is a scary side, ranked 13th in the world, has a goal differential of plus-20 in their qualifying group after six matches without a defeat. 

Italy-Argentina (2:45pm) - So who does avid footy fan Pope Francis root for in this one? (I know, I know, the whole world used that one today.)

Switzerland-Brazil (2:45pm) - Neymar avoided a press conference, just hours ahead of the match, leaving the band of journalists fuming. But poor Neymar was still reeling after being profiled at a local boutique when told a handbag he wanted to look at was too expensive for him.

England-Scotland (3pm) - For the good of this historic rivalry match, please invite Gazza. Oh, and Wayne Rooney too.

Belgium-France (3pm) - Yes, England is not involved here but between these two sides, there's around 20 Premier League players. 20.

Portugal-Netherlands (3:30pm) - Of course all eyes will be on Ronaldo and Robin van Persie but the true supporters will be on the lookout to see whose gonads Pepe will stomp on.

Ecuador-Spain (4pm) - Both sides will honor the late Christian Benitez, who died last month at 27. The match will take place in Guayaquil, Ecuador, home of Barcelona SC, 6000 miles away from the Nou Camp, home of FC Barcelona.

Mexico-Ivory Coast (9pm) - No Chicharito but we do have Drogba, Gervinho, Salomon Kalou and Yaya Toure here in Giants Stadium (not calling it MetLife) in the beautiful outskirts of northern New Jersey. Mexico manager Chepo de la Torre will be seeking out help from state troopers if results don't go his way because you can bet there will be a sea of angry Mexican supporters.

Brazil 2014 World Cup Posters

FIFA has released some posters of the host cities for next summer's World Cup. I think the Sao Paulo one is my favorite, but can make you own mind up if you follow this link.

It's better than the mascot - it's armadillo that looks like a pokemon (someone had to explain to me what that was!)

Just to add a little more confusion to the offside rule

Was he in line when the ball was played?

Goal line technology may be on people's minds, but debate on the offside rule rages on

With some new changes to the offside rules coming in this season, there could be even more confusion (and hence more heated debates among geezers). FIFA has slightly changed the wording of the 'Interfering' section of Law 11, as well as the 'Gaining an Advantage' section.

I used to think that people were just not making any effort to understand what is a relatively simple rule, but now I'm a little perplexed myself. Is the player coming back from an offside position? Are they interfering? Is there daylight? Was his left ankle offside when the ball was played?

Here's FIFA's PDF on the definition of offside.

Gone are the days of sitting around with the ketchup bottle, salt shaker and HP sauce - no one really knows the rules anymore, including referees. It's been made far too complicated and I think it's the inconsistency of the decisions that infuriates players, managers and fans. It's easy to tell when Pippo Inzaghi is offside (the answer is 'always'), but how the assistant referees (linesmen) can make that call in a split second is beyond me.

Brazil 2014 ticket prices revealed

Available to work/blog/be the tea boy

Fifa reveals the cost of tickets for next summer's World Cup

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-23377890 or click here

90 dollars, 60 quid or 70 euros for the cheapest ones.