Another great article on the subject.

I was going to make several references or clarifications on the process from last expansion, but it's clear you've done your research!

Judging by the nations that made the shortlist last time, it seems like 20 is indeed the score to aim for, just as you mentioned. Also you are very correct in the assumption that the bids themselves came into play, as that final list of nations was decided mostly from the application itself.

Going through the PMs, I can't find an app for Italy, but it could've been through another channel I suppose. They have always had demand to return to international play, and I'm sure they had a bunch of players back then as well though, but I don't think they were our third choice. IIRC, the third place bid was Poland.

We made up a bunch of the rules for the expansion on the fly, since it's the first team change that has happened since the IIHF was founded in S19, so I'm curious to see what the next expansion will look like; if they take what we did and build on it, or if they change the approach.