World Cup 86 qualification

The World Cup 86 qualification tournament was a series of games to determine thirty of the thirty-two teams that will play in the World Cup 86 final tournament.

Format
182 nations registered their intention to compete in the World Cup, with hosts Drawkland and Newmanistan qualifying for the finals automatically. The remaining teams were divided into 18 groups of ten teams, each to be contested as a home-and-away double round-robin.

The winners of each qualifying group and the six runners-up with the best records directly qualified for the final tournament. The twelve remaining runners-up were paired into six playoff ties, with the winners of each tie qualifying for the finals. The remaining teams were eliminated after the group stage.

Tiebreakers
In the group stage, the ranking of teams in each group was based on the following criteria:
 * 1)  (3 points for a win, 1 point for a draw, 0 points for a loss);
 * 2) Points in matches between tied teams;
 * 3)  in matches between tied teams;
 * 4) Overall goal difference;
 * 5) Wins;
 * 6) Drawing of lots (OOC: cumulative RP bonus).

The same criteria were applied to rank the group runners-up in the main stage, which determined the six directly-qualified runners-up and the seeding for the playoffs.

Seeding
Teams were seeded into one of ten pots according to the KPB ranking system, updated as of the end of the 73rd Baptism of Fire; however, as there were twenty-one unranked teams in the draw, Yuezhou, Nethertopia and Grand Quebecois were selected to be placed in Pot 9 as the first three unranked teams to register for the tournament, while the remaining unranked teams were placed in Pot 10. Teams were drawn consecutively into Groups 1 to 18, with the positions of each team in their group (for the purposes of determining the match schedules in each group) determined by a computerised draw after the conclusion of the draw ceremony.

Playoffs
The twelve group runners-up that did not qualify directly were paired into six two-legged playoff ties by the serpentine method (i.e. the best runners-up play the worst runners-up, the second-best runners-up play the second-worst runners-up, etc.). The unseeded team in each tie played the first leg at home.


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