papereyes My thoughts on the micronation issue.
The 11 worst countries in UEFA consist of the least populous nations (every country with a side with a population of less than 1 million (Montenegro, Luxembourg, Malta, Liechtenstein, Faroe Islands, Andorra, San Marino) with two exceptions*; the next most populous country (Estonia) and three countries that lie to the East of the Black Sea (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Kazachstan)x.
On the basis of this, it seems that one could easily predict the weaker nations. A qualifying tournament could be held in the end of summer/autumn fixture windows or when nations have a friendly window (there's always one about a month into the season) to reduce the current number of 53 countries to a more managable figure such as 45 (9 groups of 5) [so 12 down to 4, for example - 4 groups of 3, winners qualify, hold a semifinal and a final to give them something to fight for#]. Qualification should mean that pre-qualification is not required in the next tournament, so sometimes more established nations might have to qualify.
You can all roll out the WaLOLes jokes at precisely that point.
*Iceland and Cyprus.
xGeorgia is the only other UEFA nation to the East of the Black sea
All three of these countries are in the next 6 of the FIFA rankings system - the bottom 17 nations in UEFA consist of the 10 smallest and 4 of the poorest.
#If we were to organise a Thought Tournament, the 12 sides entering would be San Marino, Andorra, Faroe Islands, Liechtenstein, Malta, Azerbaijan, Kazachstan, Armenia, Luxembourg, Montenegro, Estonia, Moldova.
italic - less than 1 million population
bold - east of Black sea
underline - former Soviet state
Include them all, have approx 13 groups of 4 teams where only the winner goes through. Will also reduce the number of fixtures needed so we can all go back to the better days when all internationals were played in midweek and Saturdays were given over to proper football.
