Imagining a 40-Team FIFA World Cup: Who Would Qualify in the New Format?

World football governing body FIFA is discussing (per BBC Sport) increasing the number of nations that can qualify for the World Cup, upping the current total from 32 to 40—so what does that mean for the tournament?

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Sr Fifa source says expanding World Cup to 40 spots will be researched and analysed first. Insists not linked to wider Fifa reform process.

— Richard Conway (@richard_conway) December 3, 2015"

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A 40 team World Cup? Qualification will be more competitive, new faces in the finals, UEFA doesn't lose any places. What's not to like?

— James Montague (@JamesPiotr) December 3, 2015"

With qualification for the 2018 tournament already underway and the 2022 World Cup in Qatar set to be shortened to accommodate a winter competition, the earliest likely opportunity for an expanded World Cup would come in 2026.  

Though the hosts are a long way from being decided, the USA, Canada, Colombia, England, and Australia/New Zealand are among those expected to bid for the event. For theoretical purposes, let's say the 2026 World Cup takes place in the USA—it's been a while since the last World Cup there, and it might be the ideal venue for a growing football market and (dare we suggest) a reformed FIFA.

Victor Decolongon/Getty Images

Here is how the 32 places for the 2018 World Cup in Russia will be allocated across the six confederations, with two-legged play-offs deciding the final two places:

Confederation	Places
AFC	4/5
CAF	5
CONCACAF	3/4
CONMEBOL	4/5
OFC	0/1
UEFA	13+1

1st-placed Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) vs. 5th-placed South American Football Confederation (CONMEBOL)

5th-placed Asian Football Confederation (AFC) vs. 4th-placed Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football (CONCACAF)

However, FIFA's plans for future World Cups would create an additional eight places, spread out across the confederations as part of the governing body's mission to expand the game.

It's not been confirmed how these new places would be spread, but it would fit the brief for every corner of the globe to feel the benefit of more places.

Here's one way they could be allocated for a 40-team World Cup hosted by the USA:

Confederation	Places
AFC	5/6
CAF	7
CONCACAF	4/5+1
CONMEBOL	6/7
OFC	1/2
UEFA	14

This allocation would see every confederation gain at least one place. CONCACAF, to which the USA belongs, gains another as hosts.

The remaining two places are given to the Confederation of African Football (CAF) and CONMEBOL. These extra spots are determined by CAF's position as a developing football power and the current formidable strength of the CONMEBOL nations.

There are inter-confederation play-offs between four confederations for the final places, drawn about three years before the tournament itself.

Given that we'd have to wait until 2023 for that draw to be made, we hosted a totally unofficial draw from Bleacher Report's prestigious UK office in London, and the final spots would be decided by the following play-offs:

7th-placed CONMEBOL vs. 6th-placed CONCACAF
6th-placed AFC vs. 2nd-placed OFC

Shaun Botterill/Getty Images

So now for the big question: If a 40-team World Cup were to take place tomorrow, who would qualify?

Here are the 38 teams that would qualify automatically if the groups were to finish according to the official FIFA world rankings:

AFC	CAF	CONCACAF	CONMEBOL	OFC	UEFA
Iran	Ivory Coast	Mexico	Argentina	New Zealand	Belgium	Romania
Korea Republic	Algeria	USA	Chile		Spain	Wales
Japan	Ghana	Costa Rica	Brazil		Germany	Croatia
Australia	Cape Verde Islands	Trinidad and Tobago	Colombia		Portugal	Hungary
United Arab Emirates	Tunisia	Jamaica	Uruguay		England	Turkey
	Senegal		Ecuador		Austria
	Congo				Switzerland
					Netherlands
					Italy

The final two spots would then be decided by the following play-offs, with the teams in bold going through (again, according to FIFA ranking):

Paraguay vs. Panama
Uzbekistan vs. New Caledonia

Anyone missing? Yes, in fact.

Despite the increase in the number of teams, respected footballing nations including Nigeria, Russia, Sweden and even the mighty France would all miss out due to their current lowly rankings. That said, there's still over a decade until this expanded event could ever happen, which means there's a few years to redress that.

So there you have it. The theoretical 40-team FIFA World Cup in America—appetite whetted?

At least the format once the tournament actually gets started would most likely be simple enough to change: rather than eight groups of four teams, there would be eight groups of five. It would still involve the top two advancing and the same knockout rounds.

That means an extra 32 games, with each side playing at least one more fixture in the pool stage.

So what will the footballing landscape look like in 11 years time? Lets compare the map of teams that qualified for the 2014 tournament with our theoretical World Cup map.

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Made on 29travels.com

Fast forward to 2026 and among top nations like Spain and Brazil...you have the footballing superpowers of the United Arab Emirates and Uzbekistan.

Who's in favour?