19 November 2009
The Pop World Cup 2010: Call For Players
Pop giant Sweden failed to make the final 32.
We’re looking for people who want to manage a team in next year’s Pop World Cup.
If you don’t know the concept of the Pop World Cup, it’s simple. Tracks from participating countries go head to head in a tournament to decide which country is the champion of pop. As a manager, your job is to select tracks – between 3 and 7, depending how far your team gets – for the country you manage.
The game will start towards the end of January 2010, and you’ll know who you’re managing on December 5th, so you’ll have plenty of time to find songs. That really is all you need to know!
If you want to take part, leave your name (and some kind of contact – Twitter name, email, whatever) in the comments box. This time we’re going to give you some degree of choice as to which team you get. So please either put the word RANDOM next to your name, indicating that you’ll take whatever country you’re given, or pick FOUR countries you wouldn’t mind managing. (Country selection after the cut)
The countries taking part in the Pop World Cup are the same as those taking part in the football world cup. So if you don’t want a random choice you can pick from:
Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Cameroon, Chile, Cote D’Ivoire, Denmark, England, France, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Holland, Honduras, Italy, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand, Nigeria, North Korea, Paraguay, Portugal, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain, Switzerland, United States, Uruguay
The draw (matching countries with managers) will take place at the start of Poptimism on the 4th December. We’ll allocate teams to the managers who’ve taken the random option first, then draw teams for people who named preferred countries.
That’s enough detail. This will be awesome and it is very fun to do (if sometimes heartbreaking and nerve-wracking).
Comments 
All, 1–25, 26–53.
Back up to post. More comments: All, 1–25, 26–53.
My wife is going to play this time, and wants a random team choice.
(I will also play but only if we don’t get to 32)
Cote D’Ivoire
Denmark
New Zealand
Serbia
Me please!
Slovenia
Holland
Denmark
Serbia
go on then
USA
ENG
FRA
CIV
(on a random note I have never understood why football is played by ENG/SCO/WAL/the other one, I don’t know the Northern Irish IOC code, when most international sports are played as GBR.)
I’m in, will happily take any one of:
Ghana
Nigeria
Honduras
Algeria
In that order of preference
Lex I think the American public may well be hostile to you after you failed to get them through the group stages four years ago.
RANDOM
I will take the noble Random route, as a freebooting coach for hire… Part of me would like to see if I could continue to do the double with Swuitzerland, but happy to pass that European Pop Cup winning team over to someone else.
Random should be the most fun!
ME please! I am happy with a random team.
RANDOM for me please!
lex, football is played by eng/scot/wales/ni separately because we invented it and, more importantly, invented internationals. england and scotland were playing each other at football 40 or 50 years before brazil even had a national team…
didn’t we invent quite a lot of sports that are played as GBR though? oh well it’s our loss, a united team might actually be able to win something ever.
First off, I hope this comment gets through, as for some reason I’m having trouble registering.
Here would be my picks!
Japan
Mexico
Holland
Germany
Slovenia (I have access to vast quantities of Slovene pop) and if not them, then random.
This sounds like fun, I’ll take a RANDOM
Thanks Tom – it got through :)
I’ll play. RANDOM!
Random please! Whoever gets North Korea will need all their tactical nous…
Australia
England
France
New Zealand
I would love to do Japan, have been hoping i’d be able to since going there and finding out lots of great J-pop (and other) stuff. Have some ideas for others as well though.
My 4 teams:
Japan
South Korea
Germany
Holland
North Korea
Algeria
Slovenia
Honduras
I’d love to play this year.
My top 4 are:
USA
Denmark
Australia
Brazil
I’m in, Random for me please!
@birdseeding on twitter
So many people going random, chances are any country I’d want would be taken early anyway! So random. I guess. More of a challenge should I crap out and get Slovakia!
I’m in! brazil ghana England usa