It may be half a year late, but the Draft World Cup returns for a sixth year!
With Football Manager restructuring things, most notably moving the crucial (for us) Versus Mode into the main game, and axing FM Touch, I have waited to see if the new series was viable before promising anything. As it is, everything seems okay so off we go!
This post will give an overview of how this year's competition will work, and a few rule/nation changes.
The idea
For newcomers, the Draft World Cup (DWC) is an annual tournament, where players represent the nation that they ply their trade in, rather than their nationality. So for example, Lionel Messi is now eligible for France - as he plays for PSG - having played for Spain for the previous five tournaments.
The format
The tournament itself is the standard 32-team World Cup format. But for qualifying, we are maintaining the same idea as last year - that is, each continent has its own championship, and their performance in that leads to DWC qualification:
With Football Manager restructuring things, most notably moving the crucial (for us) Versus Mode into the main game, and axing FM Touch, I have waited to see if the new series was viable before promising anything. As it is, everything seems okay so off we go!
This post will give an overview of how this year's competition will work, and a few rule/nation changes.
The idea
For newcomers, the Draft World Cup (DWC) is an annual tournament, where players represent the nation that they ply their trade in, rather than their nationality. So for example, Lionel Messi is now eligible for France - as he plays for PSG - having played for Spain for the previous five tournaments.
The format
The tournament itself is the standard 32-team World Cup format. But for qualifying, we are maintaining the same idea as last year - that is, each continent has its own championship, and their performance in that leads to DWC qualification:
To break this down further, the process is:
Let's use an example using last year's South American Championship. South America has 4 berths at the DWC.
Here are the flowcharts to show how qualification works for each side:
- Teams attempt to qualify for their continental championship
- Each continental championship has a group stage, and DWC qualification spaces will go to the teams who perform best in the group stage
- The exception is Oceania, where the sole DWC berth will go to the team who wins the whole tournament
- There will still be something to play for. The best-performing team that hasn't automatically qualified for the DWC will be that continent's representative in the Intercontinental Play-Off (ICPO), where three teams go through to the DWC.
- (New rule) If a team wins their continental championship despite having failed to gain an automatic DWC spot, then they will be given one at the expense of the worst-performing side that had previously earned automatic qualification.
Let's use an example using last year's South American Championship. South America has 4 berths at the DWC.
- All 10 teams in South America automatically enter the championship, so there was no need for qualifying
- The championship has two groups of 5, so the top 2 in each group qualify for the DWC. And in this case, Argentina, Chile, Brazil and Colombia took those places
- Paraguay, Ecuador, Bolivia and Venezuela finished 3rd-4th in their groups, so made it through to the KO stages, with a chance of making the ICPO.
- Paraguay were the only one of these teams to make it to the semi-finals, to secured their ICPO spot.
- Paraguay actually went on to win the whole tournament. Last year, this had no further impact other than the silverware itself, but this year it would have given them automatic DWC qualification at the expense of Brazil, who were the previously-qualified side with the worst record.
Here are the flowcharts to show how qualification works for each side:
Regulars may notice a tweak with Europe's qualification, this is covered in the next section.
The teams
There are a few tweaks:
This was going to be it, but just before I started writing this article, the Russian invasion of Ukraine occurred. I generally prefer to try and keep out of geopolitics, because this is an incredibly niche blog and it doesn't matter. A good example is how last year I moved Israel to Asia to reflect their geographic location, ignoring the fact that in reality this would be politically impossible.
However, the profile and obvious aggression of the Russian invasion is impossible to ignore. Therefore, for this year's DWC:
It feels ridiculous that I am having to do this, but there we are. For now, the ranking points of the above teams will be frozen, but may be deflated if they do return.
Removing three teams from Europe creates a gap, and I am taking the opportunity to make a change I had considered for a while. Europe already has three sides that aren't nations (either sporting or politically): Catalonia, Basque Country and Two Sicilies. These are to be given the status of Associate DWC teams.
These three Associate teams will be joined by nine new teams, who will take part in pre-qualifying for the right to join the main European qualifying.
So with all these changes in mind, this is how the rankings table looks ahead of the new campaign. Changes are in comparison to the start of last year's campaign:
The teams
There are a few tweaks:
- Suriname and Guyana have been moved from North America to South America, reflecting their geographic location. Whilst this should also apply to French Guiana, it would take the number of South American teams to 13 which is a nightmare, so that's that for now.
- Zanzibar are a new side, with enough players in the database to create a team.
- Chinese Taipei are now named Taiwan, as that is the name for the territory.
This was going to be it, but just before I started writing this article, the Russian invasion of Ukraine occurred. I generally prefer to try and keep out of geopolitics, because this is an incredibly niche blog and it doesn't matter. A good example is how last year I moved Israel to Asia to reflect their geographic location, ignoring the fact that in reality this would be politically impossible.
However, the profile and obvious aggression of the Russian invasion is impossible to ignore. Therefore, for this year's DWC:
- Russia will be excluded, along with Belarus
- Crimea will also no longer be included. They previously were as it was a nation within FM's database, but doing so now feels wrong
It feels ridiculous that I am having to do this, but there we are. For now, the ranking points of the above teams will be frozen, but may be deflated if they do return.
Removing three teams from Europe creates a gap, and I am taking the opportunity to make a change I had considered for a while. Europe already has three sides that aren't nations (either sporting or politically): Catalonia, Basque Country and Two Sicilies. These are to be given the status of Associate DWC teams.
These three Associate teams will be joined by nine new teams, who will take part in pre-qualifying for the right to join the main European qualifying.
- The new Associate teams are: Aland (Finland), Balearic Islands (Spain), Bavaria (Germany), Canary Islands (Spain), Cornwall (England), Corsica (France), Fife (Scotland), Sardinia (Italy) and Yorkshire (England). These are based loosely on regions with its own separatist movement or strong local identity.
So with all these changes in mind, this is how the rankings table looks ahead of the new campaign. Changes are in comparison to the start of last year's campaign:
The most notable fall has to be Italy, who had a just terrible year last time round. It's not clear whether the low point was their 8-0 defeat to the new number 1 nation France, or the stunning 3-3 draw with Iraq that saw them fail to make the DWC's knockout stages. The other big team to toil were Brazil, who fall from 7th all the way to 13th, leaving Argentina as the only non-European side in the top 8.
The squads
Each team can select players who:
Each rule supersedes the ones below it. So a player who is out of contract and has a primary nationality (A) and a second nationality (B) will only be available for B if they aren't selected in the squad of A. For example, last year Emmanuel Adebayor was a free agent. His primary nationality is Togo, so he represented them in DWC qualifying. However, when Togo failed to qualify for the DWC finals, he was available to join Nigeria, his second nationality.
As with last year, the Associate nations can only pick players from outside the top flight of the country they are in. For example, Yorkshire will not be able to pick players from Leeds United in the Premier League, but can pick players from Championship side Hull City.
Finally
Obviously this year's edition is crammed into the final half of the year due to the late release of Versus Mode. On top of that, our second child is due at the end of May, so time is not on my side.
With this in mind, updates for this year will cover more ground than usual.
Anyway, hopefully this all makes sense and you'll join me in this year's expedition!
The squads
Each team can select players who:
- Play for a club within that country (including on loan)
- Are out of contract and are of that country's nationality
- Are out of contract and have that country as a second nationality
- Is on an amateur contract and is of that nationality
Each rule supersedes the ones below it. So a player who is out of contract and has a primary nationality (A) and a second nationality (B) will only be available for B if they aren't selected in the squad of A. For example, last year Emmanuel Adebayor was a free agent. His primary nationality is Togo, so he represented them in DWC qualifying. However, when Togo failed to qualify for the DWC finals, he was available to join Nigeria, his second nationality.
As with last year, the Associate nations can only pick players from outside the top flight of the country they are in. For example, Yorkshire will not be able to pick players from Leeds United in the Premier League, but can pick players from Championship side Hull City.
Finally
Obviously this year's edition is crammed into the final half of the year due to the late release of Versus Mode. On top of that, our second child is due at the end of May, so time is not on my side.
With this in mind, updates for this year will cover more ground than usual.
Anyway, hopefully this all makes sense and you'll join me in this year's expedition!