The WADA ruling allowed athletes who were not involved in doping or the coverup to compete, but prohibited the use of the Russian flag and anthem at major international sporting events.

[4] An appeal to the Court of Arbitration for Sport was filed,[5] but WADA's decision was upheld though reduced to a two-year ban.

[7] On 27 February 2022, after the threat of boycotts by the Czech Republic, Poland and Sweden amid the Russian invasion of Ukraine,[8] FIFA prohibited the Russia national football team from playing home matches in Russia; the team would have to play matches behind closed doors at neutral sites.

[18][19][20] On 4 December 2019, the UEFA Executive Committee initially approved the use of the video assistant referee system for the qualifiers.

[24][25] The changes to the International Match Calendar for March and September 2021, which extended each window by one day, were approved by the FIFA Council on 4 December 2020.

[34] The draw was presented by Spanish journalist Cristina Gullón and conducted by FIFA's acting director of competitions, Jaime Yarza.

[35] He was assisted by former footballers Daniele De Rossi and Rafael van der Vaart, who drew the balls from the pots.

[37] The following restrictions were applied with computer assistance:[25][38][39] Teams were allocated to seeding pots as follows (November 2020 FIFA Rankings shown in second column).

[42][43][44] Qatar were partnered with the five-team Group A, which enabled the 2022 FIFA World Cup hosts to play centralised friendlies against these countries on their "spare" match dates.

Based on the results from the qualifying group stage, the six best-ranked teams were seeded, while the bottom four were unseeded in the semi-final draw.

[49][50][51][52][53] The following procedure was applied in the draw:[48][54] For political reasons related to the Russo-Ukrainian War, Russia and Ukraine could not be drawn into the same play-off path.