Independent Associations Championship 10

The 10th Independent Associations Championship, stylistically referred to as IAC X, was an international tournament held in Omerica.

New Lusitania entered the tournament as defending champions, but were eliminated in the quarterfinals by HUElavia. Poafmersia defeated HUElavia in the grand final at the Stade de la République in Romainbourg, becoming the ninth nation to win the tournament. Conversely, HUElavia matched Drawkland’s record for most IAC grand final defeats and extended their own record for most appearances in the grand final without a victory.

Host selection
There were two bids to host the tournament, a Casaran bid from Reçueçn and a conventional group stage bid from Omerica. The Omerican bid was selected by a two-vote margin.

Draw
Teams were seeded into one of five pots according to a formula taking into account results from the last three editions of the IAC and the KPB rankings as of the end of the World Cup 85 finals; as there were eleven teams for whom a ranking could not be calculated in the draw, Hopal, The Calculator and Squidroidia were selected at random to be placed in Pot 4, while the remaining unranked teams were placed in Pot 5. Omerica and New Lusitania were seeded in Pot 1 by right as hosts and titleholders respectively. Omerica were automatically assigned to Group A, while the remaining teams were drawn consecutively into Groups A to H. The positions of each team in their group (for the purposes of determining the match schedules in each group) were determined by a computerised draw after the conclusion of the draw ceremony.

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) Goals scored in matches between tied teams;
 * 5) Overall goal difference;
 * 6) Overall goals scored;
 * 7) Wins.

In the event that more than two teams were initially tied and at least one team won or lost a tiebreaker, the tiebreaking procedure would restart from the first tiebreaker for any teams which might still be tied. If two or more teams were tied on all the above criteria, results against the lowest-ranked team not involved in the tie would be discarded and the ranking procedure would restart; in the unlikely event that all results were equal, the teams’ ranks were determined by drawing of lots.

In the knockout stage, if a match was tied at the end of normal playing time, two fifteen-minute periods of would be played. If the match was still tied at the end of extra time, a would be held to determine the winners.

Venues
Sixteen venues in sixteen cities were selected to host matches at the Championship, chosen for geographic diversity and to respect equality between anglophone and gallophone cities; each venue hosted six matches, five in the group stage and one in the knockout stage. Falconbarrow and Romainbourg were selected to host the opening match and grand final respectively for their historical symbolism: Falconbarrow as the city where the Omerican Civil War began and Romainbourg as the city where the Omerican War of Independence ended.