That would have been fun,
tho maybe a bit too restricting... I mean.. teams outside the top 12 can still compete for medals at NT level, and at u21 level you might end up excluding countries like England that could have a golden generation but can’t really achieve something “truly meaningful"
Unfortunately 98 is a stupid number to work with... maybe 96 would have been better since you can split it into 64 and 32
But maybe even with 98 you can still make some kind of division — like 72 and 26 (or 50 and 48)
Then you could have 72 teams actually competing for the World Title, with various consolation groups for the losing teams (so at least they face opponents closer to their level) and maybe add a couple of promotion/relegation spots between the two blocks
Because honestly if a nation has a real golden generation, even playing with only 20-year-olds, they should still be able to stay within the top 50 in the world imo