Pep Guardiola has always said that national teams won't do Manchester City any favours, so why would he make decisions with the World Cup in mind?
Given the nature of City's world-class squad, Guardiola would have expected most of his players to be involved in the World Cup until mid-December - and they wouldn't be thinking about the Premier League or Carabao Cup while they still had a World Cup to win.
As it happens, two national sides have unintentionally done City a favour by underperforming and crashing out in Qatar at the group stages. So when attentions do turn to City's Carabao Cup clash vs Liverpool in three weeks, Guardiola will have two players available that he won't have been expecting.
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It felt inevitable that Belgium wouldn't be winning the World Cup as soon as their talisman openly said they wouldn't because the team was too old. If Kevin De Bruyne's comments were eye-catching, they could also be put down to his understated, low-key personality. It's not the first time he's given a self-deprecating interview, and it won't be the last.
The reaction to the interview from within the Belgium squad, though, appears to have sealed their fate, with teammates and manager Roberto Martinez lining up to offer different opinions that overshadowed their final two group games. Instead of building on a fortunate 1-0 win over Canada, they lost to Morocco and were toothless in a 0-0 draw against Croatia.
Even De Bruyne, who has carried City through so many games, couldn't force a winner to scrape Belgium into the knockout stages. Now, he has a three-week break before City's festive fixtures that Guardiola won't have been accounting for at all.
Likewise, Guardiola would have been brave to predict Germany going out in a group containing Japan and Costa Rica. However, their task was made more difficult when they were beaten by a brave Japan side on the opening round, and they weren't able to better Spain. That left qualification out of their hands, and Japan added Spain to their collection of World Cup scalps to progress and dump Germany out.
Gundogan's country may not have been among the favourites to win the World Cup, but had they qualified in second place they would have faced Morocco and been favourites to progress to the quarter-finals, spending at least another week in Qatar. Now, Gundogan joins De Bruyne in having a three-week break before turning attentions to facing Liverpool in the League Cup.
Having two players of such importance to face a quality side will strengthen City's options significantly, and reduce the need to rush anyone back who is spending longer in Qatar. City already have Erling Haaland, Riyad Mahrez, Sergio Gomez, Stefan Ortega and Cole Palmer to build a team around for Liverpool, so when De Bruyne and Gundogan are added to that completes the majority of a competitive forward line.
Manuel Akanji may still progress to the knockout stages with Switzerland, but will face a challenge to reach the quarter-finals if Portugal await in the last-16. City also have Sergio Gomez to feature against Liverpool, in what may be a more experimental defence.
However, Kyle Walker is back fit to ease the pressure on Joao Cancelo going forward, and (assuming Portugal top their group), then only one of Spain and Portugal will get past the quarter-finals as the winners of their last-16 ties face each other - meaning either Aymeric Laporte and Rodri or the Portuguese trio of Bernardo Silva, Ruben Dias and Joao Cancelo will get around 12 days to prepare for the Liverpool clash.
With England facing a potential quarter-final with France, the five City players in the Three Lions squad may also be heading back to England at the same stage, while Nathan Ake's Netherlands could face Julian Alvarez's Argentina in the last-eight to ensure at least one will return to City with 12 days to go before Liverpool visit.
Pep Guardiola would love for as many of his players to have a chance of winning the World Cup, however he won't complain too much that Belgium and Germany have gone out, while Spain's slip-up and the other last-16 pairings mean at least three more players will get nearly two weeks between their final World Cup game and the resumption of domestic football.
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