Swiss Style World Cup

Draws are a natural outcome of soccer games.

Too bad that the World Cup champion is determined in a tournament that does not allow draws.

In master-level chess, draws are also a predominant result.

Many chess tournaments are so-called Swiss style tournaments. In a Swiss style tournament, in each round of play matches are arranged so that players with the closest number of points play eachother. E.g., at the first round, it could be a seeding or a random order. Next round, winners play other winners, players that drew in the first round play others who drew, and the loosers play each other. In the second round, players that have won twice, play eachother, whereas players who have lost twice play each other. And so on.

In only a few rounds of play, you have a nice sorting of the strong to the weak. In the recent world cup, one could have imagined after a few rounds Brazil, Portgal, Spain and Germany (each won their first three games) having percolated to the top after a couple of games. Whereas, Serbia/Montenegro, Togo, and Costa Rica, may have found themselves matched against each other for the honor of avoiding last place.

A major obstacle is the scheduling. However, you don't know what teams will be in the elimination phase of the current style tournament. Ticket prices could be set according to the relative importance a game is expected to have for the ultimate winner. Furthermore, a web-based secondary market for tickets could be established to allow for trading of tickets, thereby avoiding people being stuck with watching games they have no interest in.