Teams qualifying for Europe receive a bye to the third round of the EFL Cup.
And ordinarily, the teams who finish 18th and 19th in the Premier League receive a bye into round two – with the rest of the top-flight teams who avoided relegation.
But all this depends on the number of clubs who qualify for Europe, which affects the number of slots in the third round. The more teams who get a bye to round three, the fewer slots there are for teams to come through round two.
For the straight knockout format to work, there must be 32 teams in round three.
That means if eight teams have had a bye through qualifying for Europe, 24 teams must come through from the second round.
And that means 24 knockout ties in round two – which must therefore have 48 teams. And it means 36 teams must come through from the first round.
For the maths to work, West Ham and Burnley must start in the first round, to be played on the weekend of 7-9 August. They make it 72 teams and 36 first-round ties.
With nine teams having qualified, it is a little more complicated.
Only 23 slots are available in round three, so the EFL must lose a tie – or two teams – via preliminary round fixtures.
It will feature the two teams promoted from the National League – York and Rochdale – and the clubs who were 21st and 22nd in League Two – Tranmere and Crawley.
But there is a snag, because the first round is regionalised into northern and southern sections.
When this happened last season, there was the perfect solution. Accrington played Oldham and Barnet took on Newport – one winner feeding into the north and the other to the south.
Next season, three northern clubs and one from the south are set to be in the preliminary round.
The EFL could choose Crawley to play Tranmere – the most southerly of the three northern clubs in the preliminary round.
Rochdale and York would then meet in a repeat of last season’s dramatic automatic promotion decider.
But Tranmere are also the furthest club west – indeed all three northern clubs are a similar distance from Crawley. So the EFL might just hold an open draw for the preliminary round – and one club would have to go into the south for the first round.
The EFL could then potentially rebalance the regions for the second-round draw, if for instance York were misplaced in the south.
As the preliminary round will take place just before the first round, there is realistically not enough time to play those ties, and then hold another draw.
