World Cup teams selected

Team Selection

Here are the 32 Men's teams which have been selected to take part in the World Cup:

1- GERMANY
2- BELGIUM
3- USA
4- CZECH REPUBLIC
5- FRANCE
6- AUSTRIA
7- UK
8- ITALY
9- SWITZERLAND
10- NETHERLANDS
11- SLOVAKIA
12- CANADA
13- DENMARK
14- HUNGARY
15- JAPAN
16- LUXEMBOURG
17- BULGARIA
18- POLAND
19- ROMANIA
20- INDIA
21- SLOVENIA
22- LITHUANIA
23- UNITED ARAB EMIRATES
24- IRELAND
25- RUSSIA
26- SOUTH AFRICA
27- ARGENTINA
28- CHINA
29- SPAIN
30- NORWAY
31- BRAZIL
32- CAMEROON

Please note that the first 8 teams make up the primary Top Seeds.
Teams 9 to 16 make up the secondary Top Seeds.

5 more teams are currently on the waiting list:

1- COSTA RICA
2- ALGERIA
3- PORTUGAL
4- MALAYSIA
5- MONGOLIA

In case one or more of the 32 selected teams withdraws or can not make it to the World Cup, the teams on the waiting list will be able to compete, in the order above.


Here are the 20 Women's teams which have been selected to take part in the World Cup:

1- CZECH REPUBLIC
2- GERMANY
3- BELGIUM
4- AUSTRIA
5- USA
6- FRANCE
7- NETHERLANDS
8- UK
9- ITALY
10- SWITZERLAND
11- DENMARK
12- SLOVAKIA
13- HUNGARY
14- BULGARIA
15- JAPAN
16- POLAND
17- LITHUANIA
18- ROMANIA
19- RUSSIA
20- SOUTH AFRICA

Please note that the first 8 teams make up the 8 Top Seeds.


6 more teams are currently on the waiting list:

1- CHINA
2- SPAIN
3- ALGERIA
4- COSTA RICA
5- MALAYSIA
6- MONGOLIA

In case one or more of the 20 selected teams withdraws or can not make it to the World Cup, the teams on the waiting list will be able to compete, in the order above.


Team Rankings

The selection of the countries was done through an Executive Committee's vote which took into account the new ITSF World Rankings of Men's National Teams and Women's National Teams.

So far national teams were ranked by adding the following:
- Points earned by the 6 best male players of each nation, in the ITSF Rankings - points added from the Open Singles and Open Doubles competitions -
- Points earned by the 2 best female players of each nation, in the ITSF Rankings - points added from the Women’s Singles and Women’s Doubles competitions -
- Points earned by national teams at the World Cup and at the World Championship Series events which feature a National Teams Competition
(See chart in Annex 1 of the ITSF Sport Code)


However, that applied to ranking of mixed teams, since until now there have not been separate events for Men's teams and Women's teams.

In order to rank Men's teams and Women's teams and in order to take into account Junior and Senior players’ performance in the team rankings, 3 new types of rankings have been implemented:

1) General Rankings for the mixed national teams which take part in the WCS team events:

Points are awarded to ITSF member federations by adding the following:
- Points earned by the 8 best male players of each nation, in the ITSF Rankings - points added from the Open Singles and Open Doubles competitions
- Points earned by the 6 best female players of each nation, in the ITSF Rankings - points added from the Women’s Singles and Women’s Doubles competitions
- Points earned by the 3 best junior players of each nation, in the ITSF Rankings - points added from the Junior Singles and Junior Doubles competitions
- Points earned by the 3 best senior players of each nation, in the ITSF Rankings - points added from the Senior Singles and Senior Doubles competitions
- Points earned by national teams at the World Cup and at the World Championship Series (National Teams Competition)

Please note that the current system remains valid until the end of the current ITSF Tour (end of October) and the new system above will be implemented at the beginning of the 2009 Tour (November 1st).


2) Men's Rankings for the Men's national teams which will take part in the World Cup:

Points are awarded to ITSF member federations by adding the following:
- Points earned by the 8 best male players of each nation, in the ITSF Rankings (this corresponds to the number of players in a standard Men's team) - points added from the Open Singles and Open Doubles competitions -
- Points earned by national Men's teams at the World Cup and mixed teams at the World Championship Series (National Teams Competition)

This ranking system is being implemented as of now.
Please note that since there has not been any Men's team event yet, the points from the 2006 World Cup are taken into account for now. After the 2009 World Cup, the points of the National Men's teams will be taken into account.


3) Women's Ranking for the Women's national teams which will take part in the World Cup:

Points are awarded to ITSF member federations by adding the following:
- Points earned by the 6 best female players of each nation, in the ITSF Rankings (this corresponds to the number of players in a standard Women's team) - points added from the Women's Singles and Women's Doubles competitions -
- Points earned by national Women's teams at the World Cup and mixed teams at the World Championship Series (National Teams Competition)

As for the Men's teams, this ranking system is being implemented as of now and since there has not been any Women's team event yet, the points from the 2006 World Cup are taken into account for now. After the 2009 World Cup, the points of the National Women's teams will be taken into account.



Team Seeding

In the Men’s World Cup, there will be 2 seeded teams in each group of 4 teams: 1 primary seed (teams 1 to 8 from the Rankings) and 1 secondary seed (teams 9 to 16).
In the Women’s World Cup, there will be 2 seeded teams in each group of 5 teams: 1 primary seed (teams 1 to 4 from the Rankings) and 1 secondary seed (teams 5 to 8).

Also, since there have only been mixed team events so far, the winner of the 2006 World Cup (Austria) is not seeded first for the 2009 World Cup but depending instead of the ranking system above.
Then starting with the 2010 World Cup, the winner of the 2009 Men's World Cup will automatically qualify and be seeded first for the 2010 Men's World Cup, and similarly, the winner of the 2009 Women's World Cup will automatically qualify and be seeded first for the 2010 Women's World Cup.


Group Draw

Just a reminder that the draw to determine the groups will take place live on Nantes 7 TV station on November 5th, at 6:30 pm.

Please review the elimination charts for the Men’s World Cup and the Women’s World Cup to check which teams the 2 winners of each group will compete against.