Euro 2016 qualifying draw

[spring hall convert]

Easy 10 is totally right for me. The thing I loved about the Euro's is that it was a quality tournament start to finish with very few gimmes. Win your first group match, you're as good as through. You can't have a stage in a tournament where more teams surive than go out. It's just BORING.

You forgive the World Cup for having a bit of tripe in there because it tries to be truly globally representitive.

 

[Simster]

I'm with Easy here. 24 teams is ridiculously bloated.

16 teams provided interest because that really is a World Cup light, given that Europe probably provides around half the world's best teams. 24 is just going to mean 3rd placed teams qualifying and reducing the number of hosts who could stage a tournament. And I don't see any benefit at all.

Controversially, I do however think that making France play in the qualifiers as friendlies are actually not such a bad idea as they still have ranking points to play for.

 

[mejonaNO12 aka riskit]

I was just having a little look back at Euro 2000 as that one always sticks in my head as a lot of fun. Was keen to see how competitve the groups were with 16 teams. Check THESE out

Group A (A STUNNER)
Portugal
Romania
England
Germany


Group B
Italy
Turkey
Belgium
Sweden

Group C
Spain
Yugoslavia (my FAVES)
Norway
Slovenia

GroupD
Holland
France
Czech
Denmark.


That is QUALLA competetiveness right there.

 

[Mellotron]

I was just having a little look back at Euro 2000 as that one always sticks in my head as a lot of fun. Was keen to see how competitve the groups were with 16 teams. Check THESE out

Group A (A STUNNER)
Portugal
Romania
England
Germany


Group B
Italy
Turkey
Belgium
Sweden

Group C
Spain
Yugoslavia (my FAVES)
Norway
Slovenia

GroupD
Holland
France
Czech
Denmark.


That is QUALLA competetiveness right there.

I would argue there isn't a single true MINNOW in there.

 

[Easy 10]

Austria beat Sweden and Ireland in the last qualifying group, so they're not that bad. Hungary and Norway would not be embarrassing inclusions either.

I agree with you that the QUALITY of the football is likely to be diluted, although people presumably said the same thing when the World Cup went from 24 to 32 teams not so long ago. However, I think representation from more parts of the continent will make for more of a SPECTACLE. It'll be great to have more variation in the teams we can play/watch, plus it means an extra round of matches which is no bad thing. Who wants England to be up against Holland, Germany and Spain in the group stage? If you're that obsessed with the standard of football, why not go back to having four teams in it and starting straight from the semis? Comparing it to the World Cup for a moment, I actually really enjoy watching us against more unusual opponents before coming up against (and losing to) the big guns. Obviously I'd draw the line at the minnows being involved, but proud football countries like Austria, Hungary and Belgium (all of whom missed out in 2012) all have something to add.

For me, the downside of this is not the tournament at all, it's the utter nonsense that is qualifying for the major nations. England, for example, would have to finish below Switzerland, Slovenia AND Estonia in order to miss out on Euro 2016, which is absurd. UEFA may as well give certain countries a bye and spare us this charade. But I'm confident when the tournament comes round it'll be a good one.

The quality of the football will be diluted, as you rightly observe. And we won't have more variation in the teams we play and watch there at all. There won't be any "unusual opponents". We'll just be seeing a cluster of those below-average lesser nations we dutifully troop round to in qualification, who would usually have been eliminated long before having a sniff of the Finals.

And in order to accomodate this brainwave, most of the groups will have 3 out of 4 teams qualifying. Whatever way you slice it, thats just nuts. One solitary win and you're through to the knockouts. A couple of draws will probably be enough. It'll be the polar opposite of a SPECTACLE - that group stage is going to be a complete snoozefest.

A whole extra round, just so we can have more flotsam taking part, and more games for TV. Thats total gubbins. What a turn-off.

 

[hans kraay fan club]

On the plus* side, eight qualifying matches against Estonia, San Marino, Slovenia and Lithuania will probably see Rooney rack up the ten or so goals he needs to become England's all time top scorer. Hooray.



*not plus.

 

[Seaber]

If the final 24 was based on the FIFA rankings:
1 spain
2 germany
3 portugal
4 switzerland
5 italy
6 netherlands
7 belgium
8 greece
9 england
10 croatia
11 bosnia herzegovina
12 ukraine
13 france
14 denmark
15 russia
16 sweden

The extra eight teams:
17 slovenia
18 serbia
19 armenia
20 czech republic
21 romania
22 scotland
23 turkey
24 austria

The rest:
25 hungary
26 iceland
27 wales
28 montenegro
29 slovakia
30 albania
31 israel
32 norway
33 finland
34 republic of ireland
35 poland
36 bulgaria
37 belarus
38 fyr macedoia
39 northern ireland
40 estonia
41 azerbaijan
42 lithuania
43 georgia
44 moldova
45 latvia
46 luxembourg
47 cyprus
48 kazakhstan
49 malta
50 liechtenstein
51 faroe islands
52 andorra
53 san marino
54 gibraltar