I fooled the cup draw. When the season began, I dropped my roster to 15 players (14 signed) and amongst them were three 1 star players. The 1* players had qualities of 42, 46 and 62 respectively.
I think it counted the not signed player towards my average quality however. If so, that deducted the Q42 player from my average quality.
Whenever I get in cup draws where I face managers levels above me, like your current one; I can never make it passed the semi-finals and I only get there when the stars align perfectly. Usually by the QTR's (if I get a fortunate draw) the managers have made the adjustments to just overwhelm me based upon quality.