Wales V Republic of Ireland - Cardiff - 6th September 2018 - UEFA Nations League

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Originally Posted by samhaydenjr

Of course none of this is as unfair, in a meritocratic sense, as having a Euro 2020 finals place set aside for teams ranked 40-55, as the League D play-offs does.

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Yes, maybe I'm an elitist but this part doesn't sit well with me.

All this reassigning of C's to B's, B's to A's and so on diminishes the tournament itself too. Basically, along with more competitive fixtures obviously, it's main purpose seems to be providing the last few spots for the Euros. I mean, the overall Nation Leagues Champions (for which a trophy is won) are far more likely to be a team from League B than League A, as very few (if any at all) A's will even need to participate in the playoffs. Realistically your Spain's and Germany's have no chance of actually winning this competition, barring a monumental disaster in qualification proper?

Ah... that makes a lot more sense!

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18.03 For the purposes of the European Qualifiers group stage draw and the European Qualifiers play-offs (see Regulations of the UEFA European Football Championship), overall UEFA Nations League rankings are established as follows (see Annex C):
a. The 12 League A teams are ranked 1st to 12th according to their league
rankings.
b. The 12 League B teams are ranked 13th to 24th according to their league rankings.
c. The 15 League C teams are ranked 25th to 39th according to their league rankings.
d. The 16 League D teams are ranked 40th to 55th according to their league rankings.

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So the league works on an exclusive basis, like a league should do, not affected by other outside influences. Thats good. But what happens if some teams are equal will it then go to UEFA National co-efficient if say they were both in Group C(along with a couple from B).

Sammy is that your opinion about the makeup of the play-offs, or have you evidence, around the weaker v the higher in a scenario where b and c are in a "mixed" play-off.

Its clearer now, if not 100%.

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Originally Posted by DeLorean

Yes, maybe I'm an elitist but this part doesn't sit well with me.

All this reassigning of C's to B's, B's to A's and so on diminishes the tournament itself too. Basically, along with more competitive fixtures obviously, it's main purpose seems to be providing the last few spots for the Euros. I mean, the overall Nation Leagues Champions (for which a trophy is won) are far more likely to be a team from League B than League A, as very few (if any at all) A's will even need to participate in the playoffs. Realistically your Spain's and Germany's have no chance of actually winning this competition, barring a monumental disaster in qualification proper?

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I don't know what a tracker mortgage is :8

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They are then separated by GD, then GS, then away GS, then number of wins, then number of away wins, and then all the way down to yellows and reds. And after that, it's UEFA Co-efficient at the start of the tournament.

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I didnt spot this earlier. That's what i was wondering, i thought it would be current but previous sounds fairer as ignores anything other than your NL really i.e. if you had a terrible nations league and Euro qualification, it wouldn't matter because it would all have come from previous performances.

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If a UEFA Nations League group winner has directly qualified for the final tournament, the next best-ranked team in the relevant league ranking (see Regulations of the UEFA Nations League) which has not directly qualified will enter the play-offs.

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I'm in two minds over this, it seems to me its kind of unfair, you could have beaten the group winner at some point, someone in a slightly easier group gets in ahead of you cos their group winner wasn't as good as your group winner.

if they have so much time to figure out these playoffs they should be played at neutral venues for the final i think.

At least if UEFA try and pull a fast one, they'll have a lawsuit pending with all the research done here. :)

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Originally Posted by paul_oshea

their group winner wasn't as good as your group winner.

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That'd be highly subjective given everything was seeded in advance.

I'd imagine if its the case of C, its the next highest ranked C team below the other C teams participating. So a team not expecting anything actually gets a shot in a play-off. That would cover 2 scenarios above.

Yeah, I think the 3 best ranked second placed C teams would go into the B playoff and the 4th ranked second placed C team would go into the A playoff.

So, in theory, 3 C teams can qualify via the playoffs.

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Originally Posted by paul_oshea

I'd imagine if its the case of C, its the next highest ranked C team below the other C teams participating. So a team not expecting anything actually gets a shot in a play-off. That would cover 2 scenarios above.

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This is correct. That's the reason why they build the Euro play-offs from League D up rather than the other way around, to ensure group winners benefit by facing lower-ranked opposition if additional places need to be allocated.

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