Absent in Russia: The best XI of players not at the 2018 World Cup

By Oliver Young-Myles

The World Cup is the stage for the very best footballers on the planet to congregate once every four years. At least, that is what is meant to happen.

Sadly, some will miss out through injury. Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain, in the form of his life for Liverpool, will miss out for England due to a knee injury while Laurent Koscielny ruptured his achilles playing for Arsenal, rendering him unavailable for France.

Others, though, will not participate in Russia on account of their nation's failure to qualify. For some, the odds were stacked against them from the outset on account of representing a small nation, while others, playing for historically larger countries, will also spend their summer on a beach somewhere rather than in Russia.

Here is an XI of players that will not be taking part in this summer's World Cup after their nations failed to progress beyond the qualifiers.

Goalkeeper: Jan Oblak (Slovenia)

Anyone with a soul would have felt for Gianluigi Buffon as the tears flowed in the wake of Italy's play-off defeat to Sweden and while goodwill towards him has cooled somewhat in the wake of his defamatory comments towards Michael Oliver, that isn't the reason why his name is absent here.