While the majority of the soccer-loving world has its eyes on two major continental championship events either ongoing or coming up, between the Copa America Centenario and Euro 2016, there was a World Cup being played too.

Only, this World Cup, the World Football Cup 2016, was played by 12 countries you’ve likely never heard of, and there’s a reason for that. It is an event put on by the organization known as Confederation of International Football Associations (CONIFA), which exclusively governs regions and localities of disputed legitimacy.

Basically, these places aren’t recognized as independent by FIFA or many political bodies, but they still want to be recognized as independent soccer-playing nations.

Winning the event this year was Abkhazia, a disputed Eastern European country that most of us would think of as part of the country we know as Georgia. They beat Panjab, a region in South Asia, by a 6-5 score in the final in front of their own people in Abkhazia.

Northern Cyprus took third place, defeating the team from Padania, a region in northern Italy…and you likely had no idea either of these places thought of themselves as independent or wanting independence either.

The event had its original tournament two years ago in Sweden, with the mighty Isle of Man getting defeated by the legendary French County of Nice in the final.

CONIFA has just 35 total members, only 12 of which participated in the their World Cup. Interestingly enough for United States of America, the “disputed” territory of Cascadia is a member of CONIFA (a.k.a. Oregon, Washington and British Columbia), but did not make its World Cup this time around.

There’s even recognition for Canadian province Quebec and a region of Germany known as Franconia.

No such luck was had for the likes of Western Armenia or the United Koreans in Japan this time around. There’s always next time though, right?

[TIME]

About Andrew Coppens

Andy is a contributor to The Comeback as well as Publisher of Big Ten site talking10. He also is a member of the FWAA and has been covering college sports since 2011. Andy is an avid soccer fan and runs the Celtic FC site The Celtic Bhoys. If he's not writing about sports, you can find him enjoying them in front of the TV with a good beer!