That was 40 years ago. I assumed, rather foolishly, that the OP was talking about future qualification not ones from the 1970s

I just can't see anything wrong with the current formal. European teams are consistently doing well at the World Cup and even stronger teams like Sweden and Ukraine can't qualify consistently, so I don't understand why the European teams should be subjected to even greater tests? What's wrong with the way European teams are performing? In the last two World Cups, European teams did much better than South American teams.

I think all questions about European selection are answered.