Quarter-final preparation times a matter of horses for courses

Like it or not, last weekend’s typhoon-related cancellations in the final round of World Cup pool games have given us some inequitable quarter-final match-ups in terms of preparation times for the protagonists.

For all the politicking going on behind the scenes about the fairness of playing or not playing decisive games, there was little argument that with super-typhoon Hagibis barrelling towards Japan’s eastern seaboard safety concerns were paramount in the minds of organisers with more than just the teams and their qualification aspirations among their duty of care requirements.