Winter World Cup WINNER - poweewee (Philippines)

[Thrutchy]

A downside is to those players who are top in there qualifier group. Those players now need to go through 1 more round for the rest of the tournament and increases the likelihood of being knocked out sooner relative to the final round.

The biggest downside in my opinion is simply that is a change in the clearly defined rules in the middle of competition. Making changes will undermine the credibility of the tournament.

That being said, I also agree that a 7:1 reduction in the very first round is quite drastic.

Here's another idea: go double-elimination. The 2nd place finishers in the qualifiers would start the first "losers" bracket round. The winner's bracket would look identical to the original rules.