Losing Everything In One Match Is Unfair

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In my childhood, I did not understand the significance of what the Americans were doing in basketball when they held matches called "playoffs". Where two teams meet in the playoffs 5 or 7 times, with the team that wins more matches winning the title. The glory went to teams who survived the longest.

In the beginning, I thought that the playoffs were just useless prolongation to make more money and that whoever wins the first match will definitely win in the end. But football explains what the other side of this coin is like.

In the 2012-2011 season, the Swiss team Basel managed to beat Bayern Munich 0-1 at home in the round of 16 of the UEFA Champions League. But, the Bavarian giant returned in the second leg and won by seven goals to 0. Bayern then continued until the final, when they lost by penalty shootout against Chelsea. If it was down to one match, Basel would have advanced as one of the biggest football surprises.

In the 2014 World Cup, the German national team played the best football, according to everyone's testimony, but in the final match, they did not play their best matches,

Germany had difficult circumstances surrounding them with the injury of midfielder Sami Khedira before the start of the match, and the start of an inexperienced player like Kramer, who in turn suffered a concussion during the match, but in the end, Germany won.

When talking with American basketball fans, the discussion is never about the champions deserved the coronation or not. They are well-deserved champions, as they give their opponents more than one opportunity to compensate. Therefore they are the best overall and the repetition of matches is what makes everyone always convinced of the local league champion, or the Champions League title winner.

The World Cup and the EURO system always allow for surprises to overthrow the strongest teams outside the tournament, and the history of titles changes - perhaps due to a referee error - which sometimes makes the defending champion focus on the controversy instead.

If Brazil was the best team in history in 1982, as many claimed they were, and they were given more than one chance to prove that against Italy. Brazil might have won most games in Italy, which means Brazil would have earned that title without an objection. Or maybe Italy would have won, and in that case, it would be unfair to call 1982's Brazil the best team in history.

With repeated chances, we'd know who is the deserving champion without objection.

League titles are fairer, as is the case of the European Champions League for the presence of home and away, as for a tournament such as the FA Cup that depends on one confrontation even in the advanced roles in it, we see weak teams make it to the final.

It remains unfair to those who play beautiful football, to be deprived because of 90 minutes, and it remains unfair to those with small budgets to ask them to submit two matches for history in front of a team that is stronger and more capable than them in everything.

But in the World Cup, in particular, it's very unfair that all efforts are buried because of a match.

All of the above remains just an attempt to see things from a different perspective. What I described as injustice, some describe as the secret behind the beauty of football, and they are right.

In Conclusion

It's a Delima really. Do we focus on making the game fairer or more entertaining? A fairer world might be a world where Greece doesn't win the 2004 Euro title,

Less than a week ago we saw North Macedonia kill Italy's chance to make it to the World Cup, the occasion was quite the surprise and a great example of the "beauty of football". But, would this still happen if there are home and away matches, or fairer, a playoff system like in basketball?

Do you want the world of sport to be fairer or more entertaining?


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19 comments
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I think the playoff system makes it fairer. Anybody and everybody have an off day now and then, Thanks for sharing your post.

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Exactly. I think this system isn't fair, it's entertaining as hell, but not fair.

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Ahhh the beautiful game. TBF as an LFC supporter it is kind of easy for me to be a happy supporter at the moment 😂

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When I wanted to think about this post to give a well thought out and beautifully formulated answer, all of a sudden all kinds of strange things happened. I lost my balance because the apples from the fruit bowl suddenly jumped against me, causing the paint to splash from my brush and now Skipper is sitting with a blue nose. I had just put red paint on my brush, by the way. But because I was about to fall, Skipper bumped his nose against the vacuum cleaner which then attacked him. Now I thought that was very unfair. Skipper couldn't help it either! But yes, that makes me think that sport should be fairer. But the whole thing was also entertaining in itself, and that also has its advantages.

To put it briefly...I'm not sure what I'd think yet.

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It seems to me that both scenarios have many positive things, for example a direct game gives the small rival more chances and if a surprise occurs that excites the public a lot. The fans really like to see those feats where the teams with fewer resources achieved important milestones, but in a series of games you give more opportunity to show who is the true strong team and they will surely end up winning as it would be in 7-game basketball. I don't know what would be fair or unfair because I like to see both situations. I think that for basketball the series of games is good, but for soccer it is not so attractive, at least in a final.

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I just found the differences interesting. To be honest, I don't think I'd be up to watching 7, or even 4 games either, even though I believe it to be fair.

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I actually think it might be better if both could happen but if I had to choose 1, I would say entertaining. Most of us who watch it want entertainment. In a way, I think the fairer way does end up with more matches.

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The playoffs are much better because it gives weaker teams a chance.

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(Edited)

Wow, this is a great piece of writing and really makes one think. I think you need to find the balance, and I suppose it's a little bit like running simulations to see how many times a team would win out of 100. That helps with calculating sports betting data.

The more games you put (i.e. playoffs) the more chance you will achieve the most likely scenario. The less games you put, the more chance of an upset.

I'm more inclined to entertainment, because this is where we can see underdogs excel.

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While I think that the play off system might be fairer overall, I think that true champions show themselves in any circumstance. The knock out games with one game is something very special and should be continued as these are "Do or Die" games. In my opinion these are the best ones to watch :)

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first of all i would love to commend for your effort in putting this together
football and sports generally is sometimes about luck
sometimes confidence and squad experience (teams)

and in as much as sports is about entertainment i still think it should be more fairer.
A FAIR GAME COMES WITH LOTS OF ENTERTAINMENT AS WELL

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It's all about the money unfortunately and all decisions these days are made to maximise profits. At least that's how I see it.

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Football is really a sports with mixed feeling....
After all the input and trainings just to be decided within 90mins of performance.
Well, the world of sports to me is already fair and entertaining but you can only appreciate these when your club is on the winning side, lol.
Imagine how happy I was when Chelsea against all odds win the Champions League and most of the late wins we get just like with Chelsea Vs Newcastle scoring in the 89th minute.
Here, I am happy but for the fans of Newcastle, they are very sad and also the fans of my rival clubs, Manchester United 😂😂

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