271 Rennia Games

The 271 Rennia Games were a series of Sporting Events competed by athletes representing each of Rennia's 34 Provinces.

Football Championship

The headlining Tournament of the Games was the Inter-Provincial Football Cup, a Tournament between all 34 Provinces.

Format

The Championship began by randomly drawing Province Names, and forming two "pools." The first game played was between the two teams drawn concurrently for each Pool (i.e. East Osseria was pulled as the first member of Pool A, so they played Cagnoy, who were pulled as the first member of Pool B). Pool A teams played at home for the first match, and Pool B teams for the second match. The Second Match was played between teams on opposite pools, as well, with matches set by drawing a team from each pool. Several Provinces played each other twice in a row because of the random nature of these Draws. The final "season" match was an intra-pool match, with provinces being drawn one-at-a-time from the same pool (i.e. the first team pulled from Pool A was North Rennian Krjstendodjl, and the second was Cagnoy, so those two played, in NRK), except for the final team drawn from each pool (due to the number of teams in each Pool being odd, at 17), which played a third cross-pool match.

A win in Regulation, Stoppage, or Overtime netted a team 3 points, a win on Penalties awarded 2 points, a Loss on Penalties awarded 1 point, and a Regulation Loss 0 points.

Following the 3-round "season" portion, the top 16 teams (ranked by points > Goal Differential > Goals for > Goals Against > Position declared a tie) progressed to a knockout stage, with the 1st-place team playing the 16th, the 2nd playing the 15th, and so on. Because there was a tie for 5th (Monzeggio & Prinece) and 9th (Ascoli & East Osseria), the teams tied for those positions played a 45-minute, 7-a-side tiebreaker game to determine their Seeding position.

The Knockout round progressed through the Round of 16, Quarter-Finals, Semi-Finals, and had a 3rd place Play-off Match in addition to the Final.

Results

South Rennian Krjstendodjl stormed through the competition to take home the Cup, and make it look easy while doing it. They scored 17 goals in the "Season" stage, and were scored on only 3 times, resulting in them having a GD of +14 going into the Knockout Stages. The next-highest scoring team was Navidny, who scored an also-impressive 12 times during the Season, and had a +8 GD going into the Round of 16. SRK's lowest-scoring game was their Semi-Final against Cagne Proper, where they scored just 3-2. Barring that game, they scored 5 goals or more in every game. In the "Season" they scored 6-2 in Mieres, 5-0 against Berezno, and 6-1 against Karebyr Centre South. In the Knockout Rounds, they won 6-1 in Stravna West, 3-2 against Cagne Proper, 5-3 in Rennia West, and 7-0 in the Final against North Bovna. They finished the tournament having scored 38 Goals in the 7 matches, and having been scored on only 9 times.

Runner-Up North Bovna also had a near-impeccable Tournament, winning all 3 of their "Season" games (the only province besides South Rennian Krjstendodjl to do so), 4-0 against Karebyr Centre North, 3-1 in Lakal, and 3-2 against Tisery Metropolitan. Their scoring record (10-3 during the "Season") improved during the post-Season before the Final, Beating East Barocaltia 3-1, Ascoli 5-1, and Cagnoy 2-0, (10-2) before being thrashed 7-0 in the Final against SRK.

Political Implications

The Excellent Performance of South Rennian Krjstendodjl boosted Independence & Anti-Rennian Groups in the Region, although the comparatively poor performance of North Rennian Krjstendodjl (Loss-Win-Penalties Loss) suppressed much of the possible reaction. The Transitional Government & Emperor Emeritus Tiberius Rex used the occassion to highlight Krjstendodjl's performance as Rennians, and supported huge gatherings of SRK supporters throughout Rennia, Karebyr, and other Cities in Rennia to support SRK in the Finals. Tickets to the games (not just the Football Cup) were also cheaper for Krjstendodi Residents, to encourage them to visit Rennia and experience Rennian Nationalist Events.

In order to guarantee that Lieutenant-Governors would not all be elected simultaneously every time, the term lengths of the first Lieutenant-Governor of 1/2 the Provinces was varied, so that 1/2 of the Provinces would elect their LGs in between Meblat Elections (and 1/3 of the time, alongside the President), and 1/2 would elect their LGs alongside Meblat Elections. The finishing order of the Provinces in the IPF Cup was used to determine which provinces would have which variations of term-lengths,