Non-FIFA football: New hope for the Unrepresented
Six years since the last non-FIFA World Cup, there is excitement once again for the teams on the fringes of the global game
In June 2018, days before the FIFA World Cup kicked off in Russia, I was at the Queen Elizabeth II Stadium in Enfield, North London, to watch Kárpátalja beat Northern Cyprus on penalties in the final of the CONIFA World Football Cup.
The few thousand in attendance that afternoon were watching the pinnacle of non-FIFA football. Premier League referee Mark Clattenburg took charge of the final and Kárpátalja - a team representing the Hungarian minority in Western Ukraine - celebrated wildly with the large contingent of Hungarians in attendance before receiving the trophy from Paddy Power himself, whose betting company had sponsored the tournament.
The 16-team tournament with representatives from five continents was held in London and the surrounding area, with each match played in front of fervent support. I was fortunate enough to witness the one and only time Bracknell was taken over by Tibetans, where a 5-1 defeat for Tibet at the hands of Kárpátalja did nothing to spoil the impromptu music and dancing in the stands.
It was the third World Football Cup organised by CONIFA, the international governing body for association football teams that are not affiliated with FIFA.
Previous editions with 12 teams had been played in 2014 and 2016, though they were by no means the first federation to organise a non-FIFA global tournament; the Viva World Cup was first hosted in 2006, while other members and entities hosted their own tournaments.
There were teething issues, last-minute schedule changes and teams struggling to even make it to London, but that is part and parcel of organising events for unrecognised territories and, in some cases, persecuted peoples. By the standards that could be expected, the 2018 edition was a great success.
CONIFalling Away
If 2018 was the pinnacle, then you can expect that means things have gone downhill since then. Unfortunately that is the case, or more to the point, things have taken a nosedive.
The 2019 CONIFA European Football Cup was successfully held Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) but the Covid-19 pandemic put an end to the 2021 edition and to the 2020 World Football Cup due to be held in North Macedonia.
Since then, only a handful of smaller continental and regional tournaments have been held, while the 2023 European competition was cancelled after hosts Northern Cyprus pulled out to aid humanitarian efforts following the Turkey-Syria earthquake, and no replacement could be found.
Two CONIFA Women’s World Cups have been held - one in 2022 and one in 2024, featuring a grand total of two and three teams, respectively. Late withdrawals and CONIFA failing to issue statements, left many fans frustrated.
Final nails
CONIFA currently has 41 members spread across six continents, but significantly, it has 33 former members.
A few of those 33 have left in the hope of eventually gaining full FIFA membership, but that is not the case for the majority. The reasons why are not always clear, but a lack of organisation, funding issues or political difficulties will have played their part for at least some former members.
Paul Watson, one of the great heroes of the non-FIFA football world who helped with organising the 2018 World Football Cup, said earlier this year on The Sweeper podcast which he co-hosts that internal affairs have blighted CONIFA in recent years. In short, he suggested that certain members hold most of the power, while others are not getting the support that such a governing body should be there to provide.
A couple of months later, in late April, CONIFA announced to no one’s surprise that the 2024 World Football Cup would be postponed until 2025.
The tournament was going to be hosted in the Kurdistan region of Iraq in June, an ambitious project at the best of times. But “due to ongoing conflicts and political instability in the region surrounding Kurdistan, a number of CONIFA members expressed safety and security concerns”, thus CONIFA decided not to go ahead.
Put bluntly, their members - who had been pulling out one by one for months, leading to CONIFA rallying round invited anyone and everyone to take part - told the organisers where to stick it.
The statement issued also read that they “expect” the tournament “to go ahead in 2025” and “attention now turns to the Road to Kurdistan 2025”. Say what you want about CONIFA, but you can’t fault their determination!
Regardless of roads to Kurdistan or anywhere else, for many fans and those involved in non-FIFA football, this postponement was where patience with CONIFA ran out.
Unrepresented representation
Just when things had never looked more uncertain, in stepped Unrepresented Sports.
Launched in late 2023 by people experienced in running non-FIFA members and organising competitions, Unrepresented Sports (US) seeks to be an event organiser, rather than an all-encompassing federation.
They gained plenty of traction on social media earlier this year, often promoting established tournaments like the Corsica Cup and the FENIX Trophy, as well as raising the awareness of teams starting out on their international journeys, such as Nauru and the Marshall Islands.
As the name suggests, they are looking to be the home of unrecognised and unaffiliated nations in other sports, too. Their ever-growing X account has been doing an excellent job of sharing news stories, sponsorship calls and good old-fashioned match info from everything from Western Sahara women’s football to Sardinian basketball.
What’s in the pipeline?
The proof of US’ pudding will be in its ability to host a tournament on at least the same scale as the 2018 CONIFA World Cup.
Shortly after going public, the organisation announced that it was planning the inaugural Independent Associations Cup (IAC), to be held in Europe in 2025.
However, spotting a gap in the market, 10 days after CONIFA’s postponement announcement, US unveiled plans for an eight-team Unrepresented World Cup (UWC) to be held in 2025.
It seems the UWC is a rebrand of the IAC, but it is more than that, in my opinion. Rather than be seen as an alternative organisation with an alternative competition, US took the opportunity to become the outright home of global, non-FIFA football.
Their statement announcing the UWC read;
Several failed attempts to organise events since then have left supporters and teams dissatisfied with the current direction of the event and Unrepresented Sports will be working to breathe new life into the competition and establish a new benchmark away from the gloss and glamour of the “mini FIFA World Cup” and instead embrace the moniker of the “rebel world cup” and focus on growing and developing fan culture around non-FIFA international football.
Punches are not being pulled. Embracing the fact that they are not part of the establishment - and therefore should not act like it - has been well-received. Rebel football is coming!
My two cents
I am sure the good people at US do not need any advice from me, but I would say that attempting to host tournaments anywhere with a real security risk is a no-no.
What made 2018 a hit was that London has a vast array of stadia, great football culture and people from every corner of the world waiting to welcome their teams. These global cities are the ones I would target, especially if you want to really build fan culture around the events.
Such places do not grow on trees, but would there be too many objections to the same few countries or cities acting as hosts? It is much better than not playing at all, surely?
Apparently, London is one of US’ two key targets for hosting in 2025, with the other also part of the UK.
Jersey is the other current frontrunner, judging by the news story from the Jersey Evening Post that US republished on its website with the headline “Jersey’s the ‘perfect place’ to stage a World Cup”.
The island would definitely be capable of hosting seven more teams, but who they are remains to be seen. Perhaps they would be members of the World Unity Football Alliance (WUFA), yet another non-FIFA federation set up in 2020 that appears to have been a forerunner to US, formed by many former members of CONIFA.
Or perhaps they will aim to include the likes of Corsica or the Basque Country, who regularly play friendlies against full FIFA members, or Nauru and the Marshall Islands, UN member nations not yet affiliated with FIFA?
Whatever the outcome, it is an exciting time again for non-FIFA football, and there is no reason to believe that the 2025 Unrepresented World Cup won’t be a huge success!
Watch this space!
Anthony Tomas is a football writer and commentator, who writes for Flashscore and World Soccer Magazine.