Neutral football supporters, like the fans of any sport, want to see the best take on the best. Fervent fans want their club or country to have the easiest possible route through the draw of a tournament, but for everyone else watching on from home it’s the prospect of a footballing clash of the titans that really whets the appetite.
Unfortunately, the introduction of ‘seeding’ means that we have to wait until the final stages of a competition before the big teams meet – if they make it that far, of course. The vulnerabilities of the seeding system were laid bare at the World Cup in 2022, when three of the eight teams that made it to the quarter-finals weren’t even seeded in Pot 1, while at EURO 2024 their respective group stage performances saw France and Belgium, seeded two and four, meet in the Round of 16.
There was uproar during the 2024/25 season too when it was announced that the League Cup (known as the Carabao Cup for sponsorship reasons) would have a seeding system to protect clubs playing in European competition – they won’t meet until the quarter-final stage at the earliest. So, when and why did football introduce seeding to its major tournaments, and does the system really work?
Planting a Seed
The World Cup, first established back in 1930, has used a system of seeding teams throughout that time. That tournament was a flagbearer for seedings, which remember are designed to keep the best teams apart and only meet in the games of the most importance. At World Cup 1930, four nations were seeded: Argentina, Brazil, United States and Uruguay. Three of them would make it to semi-finals – a box ticked for the seeding – with only Brazil missing out.
In those early World Cups, the seedings were determined by the host nation’s organising committee; a system that was, how can we put it, open to some bias and controversy where international conflicts and disagreements had damaged relations between one country and another.
Latterly, the seeding system was taken over by FIFA, who now use their own world rankings to determine who is seeded and which number they are given. It would take decades for seeding to be introduced in the continental club competitions. In fact, it wasn’t until the European Cup had been rebranded to the Champions League in 1994/95 that the best sides were protected in the draw.
In English football, the domestic cup competitions haven’t had seedings at all – well, not until the League Cup’s change in 2024/25, anyway. Instead, these competitions operate using an open draw, i.e. any team in the hat could theoretically be paired against any other. However, the biggest clubs tend to be protected, to some extent, with byes through the early rounds: in the FA Cup, Premier League clubs don’t enter the draw until the third round (when they could possibly be drawn against one another).
Why Does Football Use Seedings?
In theory, the seeding system offers the best-performing clubs, historically speaking, an advantage based upon their prior form. In the World Cup, past performances on the big stage – as well as results during the previous four-year cycle – feed into the world rankings and thus the tournament’s seeding. In theory, the best teams will be seeded and the rest, well, won’t.
However, the world rankings aren’t necessarily foolproof. At the 2014 World Cup, Switzerland were seeded while Italy and the Netherlands weren’t. Belgium are routinely seeded, despite flattering to deceive on the big stage. Nations in continents like North America tend to be well treated in the world rankings because the games they typically play are against easier opposition.
Financial Incentive
There has even been scientific research papers published into the fairness of the seeding system, and some have concluded that the format actually creates a ‘competitive imbalance’, rather than enhancing the spectacle of a tournament. On the other hand, there’s a business interest at play here, too. A World Cup final between, say, Brazil and Spain would be a truly global event: these two titans of international football would guarantee a mammoth TV audience – there’s a financial incentive to FIFA, and its supporting commercial partners, in getting the best teams to the final where possible.
More tickets will be sold in a tournament where the best teams progress to the later stages, while FIFA and its partners can charge more to advertisers and businesses wanting to have their name attached to the competition in some way.
Now imagine there were no seedings, and Brazil, Spain, Italy and Argentina were drawn together in a World Cup group, while Algeria, Sweden, Peru and South Korea were paired in another. Two of the top teams would be knocked out of the tournament, while two of those ‘lesser’ nations would progress to the latter stages. When you put it like that, you can see why FIFA would want to ‘rig’ its World Cup draw with protective seedings.
Protect and Serve
One of the reasons that the ‘big clubs’ of English football have been seeded in the Carabao Cup is because of the expanded format in the continental competitions. Because they’re playing more games in Europe now, the participants have a more stacked diary – making their entry into the League Cup more challenging.
They are given byes into the third round – fair enough, you might say. But why are they seeded to keep them apart at that stage? The six teams (Manchester City, Manchester United, Liverpool, Arsenal, Tottenham and Aston Villa) were involved in a ‘pre draw’, placing them in the bracket in positions that would keep them apart until the latter stages of the competition.
Meanwhile, in the Champions League, UEFA have taken a different view. The expanded format of the competition means that all teams will play eight opponents in the league stage, with two of that opposition coming from each seeding pot.
While there is a seeding system in place, there will still be plenty of games between the top sides – an improvement, perhaps. However, how many of those games will be meaningless, with little impact on the progress of each side in the competition? We want to see the best teams playing against each other more often, but surely only in games that have some consequence to them.
