To follow up on the Team Event likely qualifying countries -
Qualified in 4 Disciplines at 2025 Worlds -
Canada
Italy
United States
Qualified in 3 Disciplines at 2025 Worlds and LIKELY to earn a spot in the 4th Discipline at the OQE -
Japan - Men, Women & Pairs - with 4 ice dance spots available at the OQE & Yoshida/Morita finishing 22nd in the RD, Japan looks well-positioned to outright qualify in Ice Dance as well
Georgia - Men, Pairs & Ice Dance - Gubanova should not have a problem earning one of the 5 women's spots available at the OQE
Qualified in 3 Disciplines at 2025 Worlds and UNLIKELY to earn a spot in the 4th Discipline at the OQE -
France - Men, Women & Ice Dance - seems rather unlikely that Kovalev/Kovalev will earn one of the 3 pairs spots up for grabs at the OQE with Unnamed Russian & American teams as well as China entering either Sui/Li (new parternship) or Zhang/Huang (JGPF champs)
Great Britain - Women, Pairs & Ice Dance - Appleby had a rough competition this week, he is going to be on the cusp of earning one of the 5 men's spots up for grabs at the OQE
Korea - Men, Women & Ice Dance - they do not have a pairs team that can compete internationally yet (possibly this May, Cho's new partner will get his release from the RusFed), but it's hard to imagine they'll earn one of the 3 spots at the OQE, and it's also hard to imagine the Korean government would give him a passport just so they can field a full team in the Team Event (I know, they handed out passports like candy ahead of Pyeongchang, but that was a home Olympics)
Poland - Men, Women & Pairs - Dovhal/Kulesza will certainly put in a good effort to earn one of the 4 ice dance spots at the OQE, but based on their RD score here, I don't see them qualifying
Now, here is where things get interesting at the OQE...
Countries Likely to earn spots in at least 3 Disciplines between Worlds & the OQE -
Germany - Pairs & Ice Dance - their women have no shot, and neither does Starostin in the men, however Genrikh Gartung is their junior man who will be senior age-eligible next season & he's got a solid 4z among other jumps. His SB is 218.94 & there are three other guys, including Appleby, who are within 3 points of that, but his SB would slot him in as the 5th qualifier at the OQE and that SB is from juniors where he can't do a quad in the SP & no step seq in the FS - adding those in and he could get a respectable 225-230 score, IMO. In 2021, the 5th place men's qualifier at Nebelhorn was Litvintsev with a score of 228.65 - if Gartung can match that, it seems likely he will pick up one of the 5 spots available this year.
China - Men - their ice dance team has no shot; An should have qualified this week, but she may not get the shot - it might go to Yi Zhu, whose SB is actually higher than An's. Whomever they send, both have a bit of breathing room on the SB list with scores that would have them qualifying in the 4th spot at the OQE. In pairs - Sui/Li are a new partnership and Zhang/Huang are moving up from juniors - whichever team the CFSA selects, I'd bet on them grabbing the 3rd spot (along with Russia & the USA). Zhang/Huang's SB as juniors is 8 points higher than Kovalev/Kovalev.
Of the 6 teams that either are qualified or could qualify entries in 3 disciplines, it would then come down to points for the 10th spot in the Team Event. Additionally, there are the 5 quota spots available for the Team Event - priority for those spots is highest points gets first dibs. Right now, the points total for the 6 teams looks like this:
France - 1870
Great Britain - 1642
Germany - 1593
Korea - 1355
China - 1090
Poland - 659
Presumably, France would use 2 for Pairs, Great Britain would use 1 for Men, and Germany would use 1 for Women. That would leave Korea, China & Poland unable to field a full team. Keep in mind, the points are going to change as we go through the Grand Prix season next fall, and it's entirely possible that some of the countries won't wind up qualifying in all 4 or even 3 disciplines. But, right now, we can't assume that Poland is in simply because they've qualified in 3 disciplines as of Worlds.
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