The Alternative World Cup Fri, Jul 13, 2018

Congratulations to France for winning the World Cup on Sunday! They were one of the youngest teams in the tournament and provided a strong case as to why they should be taken seriously in the years to come.

Alright enough about this World Cup. I want to talk about the ConIFA World Football Cup (CWFC). This “Alternative” World Cup is a grassroots nonprofit international soccer tournament for states, de facto states, self-declared regions, ethnic minorities and isolated territories not recognized by FIFA. The tournament took place in early June this year in the greater London area in small stadiums where the average capacity was 3k people, as a comparison the smallest 2018 World Cup stadium held up to 35k people. Some of this year’s CWFC teams included Tuvalu, Tibet, Padania, Matabeleland, Abkhazia and even the Isle of Man. Kárpátalja was the surprise of the tournament, as a last-minute entry no one expected them to get out the first round let alone win the whole thing.

The end goal for all these teams is to someday be recognized by FIFA and even though technically there was only one winner of the tournament every team used this opportunity to spread awareness on topics and issues that would otherwise be ignored and because of this I think all of the teams should considered winners.