Quote:
Originally Posted by Sidney Crosby's Hat
What scares me the most is how many more Asian teams there's going to be. Right now Asia has 4.5 spots and that includes:
Australia
Korea
Japan
Saudi Arabia
Syria
In the new format, they will have 8 and with Oceania getting a guaranteed spot, I could see Australia moving back there.
So if you went by the 2018 qualifiers, the next four best teams were:
Qatar (98th world ranking)
Uzbekistan (95)
Iran (37)
United Arab Emirates (77)
By comparison, Saudi Arabia is currently ranked 67.
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Oops I swapped Iran and Syria (ranked 73) for some reason. Makes my argument stronger though!