A relatively quick solution to the WC problem, could be to take away the 4 African teams that qualify for the Repechage and give those places to 2 European teams, 1 Asian team and 1 American team (although you'd probably need to choose which team is allowed the extra place, maybe the one with the better ranking?)
No offence but the 4 African teams in the Repechage are pretty pointless, has one ever made it out?
I like the 3 solutions, although the third one doesn't really help as much as the other two
If reducing the HCA or neutral games are too big of a reduction you could always modify their group, make it easier, or a fixed schedule or something like that