I think the best way to illustrate this is by using a number of examples.
South Korea has been ruling Asia all these years (something we can't say for ourselves) . However it took them 6 World Cups before they win a game. I don't know if they would have achieved that without the home advantage. After their semi final in 2002, they could have been swell headed, but I doubt South Korea was telling themselves they could have won the world Cup. At best I think they would've expected a quarter final, given the weak group they were handed
Mexico has been ruling CONCACAF these years and has traditionally been considered the only non europe, non southamerican team worth considering. They have even hosted the World Cup on two separate occasions. However, their stated goal in 2006 was to get past the quarterfinals. (Incidentally they did not get there).
The US, with as much or less footballing pedigree as South Korea on the back of one QF appearance in 2002, gave themselves the stated objective of winning the World Cup by 2010. Given the 2006 results, its a wonder they haven't publicly recanted that stance. Everybody here would probably agree that the US very far away from winning a World Cup.
Yet we who have been catching our royal to even match them are supposed to be capable, and in 4 years to boot.
l
MAY I ALSO REMIND EVERYONE HOW FEW COUNTRIES HAVE WON THE WC EVER and you could practically take Uruguay off trhat list for all intents and purposes...
I think for a country with our player pool and financing (corporate sponsorship and fan support in particular) we should be concerned about making regular appearances to the World Cup a norm before venturing into the realm of the 'impossible'
Granted if we qualify for 2010, anything less than second round would be a dissappointment for us...However we should compare several other countries that are similarly placed and ask why they haven't been able to take the step up or worse yet, have not been qualifying consistently.
A number of African countries come to mind, but several of our concacaf adversaries as well.
We need to ask ourselves what did we have in 2006 that we didn't have before? And will it suffice in 2010 to replicate the same conditions for us to qualify?) And if it does, what then needs to be changed for us to do better than 2006? Or was it a simple 'alignment of the planets' the likes of which will never occur in another x number of years?