IQA Announces Gameplay and Groups for IQA European Games
The International Quidditch Association (IQA) recently announced the participants of the IQA European Games, which raised strong reactions in the quidditch community because of the inclusion of Australia and Hong Kong. The IQA has also announced the gameplay and groups for the tournament.
The group draw was livestreamed on June 29, where the gameplay format also was presented. First, the group seeds were shown. England inherited the seeding from the United Kingdom before its split, and Scotland and Wales are considered new unseeded Muggle quidditch teams. Despite the fact that Australia is also a new team in the European Games, it’s also the IQA World Cup 2016 champion, and it was put into Seed 1. Also in Seed 1 are France, the champion from the last European Games, and Belgium, who won second place there and also at IQA World Cup 2018.
The groups are important in Phase 1, where there will be standard group play on the first day. At the end of the first day, another group draw will happen. Based on this draw, groups will be paired together, and it will determine who will play against each other in one match in Phase 2. Phase 2 will help determine the championship bracket positions for the first teams in their groups and determine the brackets for the other teams. For example, if Italy is second place in Group A and Spain is third place in Group B and Groups A and B are paired together, Italy and Spain will play against each other and the winner will go to the championship bracket while the loser will go into the consolation bracket.
The last phase of gameplay is Phase 3, where there are three brackets. The championship bracket will have eight teams and determine the champion of the European Games. The consolation bracket will also have eight teams, but the lower bracket will have only four.
After the gameplay was explained on the livestream, the groups were finally drawn. 20 teams were divided into four groups of five.
The IQA has yet to announce anything about gameplay or a group draw for the IQA Pan-American Games, which should be held on July 9–10 in Lima, Peru. It’s probably because it’s not needed with only three teams attending.
