When the euro's expand to 24?

[DannyInvincible]

I wouldn't go that far! We came fourth in a group only six years ago and European football is too competitive to take our place at the top table for granted. I'd expect us to be involved more in Euros but in the long-term it'll be interesting what this does to the qualification process.

We've so often been the "nearly men" in recent years, but fair point in that it's not a dead certainty or something to take for granted.

In qualification for the Euros in 1992, 1996 and 2000, we finished second each campaign. We finished third in our 2004 and 2008 groups.

[Murfinator]

I'm not sure on the idea really, on the one hand it feels ridiculous that fantastic teams like Bosnia, Belgium, Turkey and Serbia won't be there. On the other throwing in the likes of Israel, Scotland, Slovakia, Montenegro. Those kind of teams could cheapen the experience. I feel like there's regularly 20 very good European teams and some harshly miss out on the Euro's.

The current situation is a bit strange really where its possibly easier to qualify for the world tournament than it is the continental one. The Euros should be more encompassing than that.

Why not have a 20 team tournament like the rugby world cup? 4 groups of 5, top 2 qualify for the quarters?

[mypost]

Good move in what sense?

The reason a finals tournament should be limited is so that there can be a higher quality tournament. I like that the Euros are nigh on impossible to qualify for.

So you must have really enjoyed the last 5 Euros without us involved then, and the 7 before we did too, when the qualification criteria and the finals themselves were minimalist, and that's putting it mildly.

In 1990, 13 European teams qualified from 33 nations. 14 of the 24 teams were from UEFA. Nobody minded. Today, only 13 countries from our region can qualify for a World Cup, yet half of South America's can qualify. That's a disgrace.

I am absolutely 100% in favour of 24 countries at the tournament. I couldn't care less how much quality the tournament has, as long as we're in it. If we're not in it, then no matter how many teams are there, it's not the same. Not only have we a great chance of qualifying, we have a great chance of getting out of the groups at the finals and making the quarter-finals. Give me that over having to sit through a 0-0 Spain-Italy borefest any day of the week.

[BonnieShels]

So you must have really enjoyed the last 5 Euros without us involved then, and the 7 before we did too, when the qualification criteria and the finals themselves were minimalist, and that's putting it mildly.

In 1990, 13 European teams qualified from 33 nations. 14 of the 24 teams were from UEFA. Nobody minded. Today, only 13 countries from our region can qualify for a World Cup, yet half of South America's can qualify. That's a disgrace.

I am absolutely 100% in favour of 24 countries at the tournament. I couldn't care less how much quality the tournament has, as long as we're in it. If we're not in it, then no matter how many teams are there, it's not the same. Not only have we a great chance of qualifying, we have a great chance of getting out of the groups at the finals and making the quarter-finals. Give me that over having to sit through a 0-0 Spain-Italy borefest any day of the week.

I have enjoyed every Euro from 96 onwards (bar the result of 04). Euro 2000 and Euro 2008 were incredible tournaments.

A finals tournament should be tough to qualify for. I of course prefer if we were there but if we aren't then I want a cracker of a tournament.

Also how do the emboldened pieces of text work?

Sure why not have a 48 team tournament? 16 is the ideal number. 20 at a push. 24 is a step backwards.

It was funny... I was watching the 2008 final and the camera panned to Blatter sitting beside Platini and I text my mate saying, "What's that c**t doing there?" and my mate responded with "Probably ensuring that a tournament as good as this never happens again". Straight after that Dunphy was talking about how 2016 will be 24 teams... My heart sank. Next year is going to be the last of the great tournaments.

[mypost]

How should they work?

I do know that if you want quality, we can go the other way, and just have a pre-1980 week long tournament with Spain, Germany, Italy, and England played at Wembley, and sod everyone else as they've no quality and can't win it, so what's the point?

But this isn't the CL. Everyone is included, and everyone has the right to get to the finals. I really enjoyed the 2002 World Cup, Ireland were involved, and there were lots of unexpected results in it all the way to the semi-finals.

[SwanVsDalton]

It was funny... I was watching the 2008 final and the camera panned to Blatter sitting beside Platini and I text my mate saying, "What's that c**t doing there?" and my mate responded with "Probably ensuring that a tournament as good as this never happens again". Straight after that Dunphy was talking about how 2016 will be 24 teams... My heart sank. Next year is going to be the last of the great tournaments.

I can see your concern but I still think you're a bit premature. There a slew of fantastic teams and fan bases not going to next year's tournament who would be not diminish the overall quality. International football in Europe isn't like the Champions League, with a few sides getting obliterated every week.

Teams like Belgium, Romania, Norway, Turkey, Serbia, Bosnia and even Armenia and Montenegro would be tough opposition against pretty much any side, particularly in tourney football when the margins are tighter.

EDIT - That's eight extra teams I named, and to think there's still teams like Slovakia, Switzerland and Slovenia who were at the last World Cup. It might diminish things with a large number of these teams almost assured qualification, but I still don't think the quality would go down match-to-match.

[SwanVsDalton]

We've so often been the "nearly men" in recent years, but fair point in that it's not a dead certainty or something to take for granted.

In qualification for the Euros in 1992, 1996 and 2000, we finished second each campaign. We finished third in our 2004 and 2008 groups.

Yeah of course we're often there or thereabouts. But there's a lot of historically 'big' teams - Belgium and Scotland, for example - who haven't been involved at the tail end of qualifying for a while. Wouldn't have taken much for us to end up in the wilderness like that. Obviously with things changing we'd have to righteously mess it up to not get within touching distance of qualifying but we like a challenge!

[pineapple stu]

EDIT - That's eight extra teams I named, and to think there's still teams like Slovakia, Switzerland and Slovenia who were at the last World Cup.

Wales are improving fairly quickly again, with great players like Ramsey, Bale and Bellamy. Just hammered Norway 4-1, to add to three consecutive qualifying wins.

I wonder would there be a possibility of, say, the first seeds being removed from qualifying and entered straight into the finals so they can play in money-spinning friendlies rather than go to San Marino?

[mypost]

No. You earn your seeding through ranking points. Beating San Marino contributes to those ranking points, and they may end up giving you the edge over another country in getting a better pot.

There will be 6 Top Seeds next time. Only the Hosts get a free pass.

[pineapple stu]

Sure you can do seedings based on world rankings. It probably won't happen - there's money in the qualifying campaign too, as we've seen with the date switches - but your post isn't a reason why it couldn't happen.

[elroy]

My biggest concern for the international game is the power of the clubs. Unfort that is where the real money at. You only see this week that the Barcelona president (I think) coming out and saying that too much time is spent away at international games. Perhaps Uefa are looking at a longer summer tournament but a shorter qualification process. I for one would be in favour of less friendlies (Reduction by max one to two a year) but offset by an increase in competitive games.

For me, the club game doesnt come close to the interational stage.

[legendz]

There are good arguments for and against staying with 16, expanding to 20 or 24. Personally I'd have supported an expansion to 20 but there must have been more support for 24 and a structure similar to the World Cups of '86, '90 and '94.
Having three teams qualify from our group at USA '94 didn't take away from the competitiveness of the group. We secured our play-off place this time around in the last game. I don't think much competitiveness will be taken away in that situation if we have won qualification with that result over Armenia and if they or the Slovak's were in a play-off as a result.

[pineapple stu]

20 is awkward as UEFA will want to avoid the idea of teams knowing what they need to do on the last day (because another country has already finished their group games. Football is a lot more competitive than rugby (where groups of 5 work because you can pretty much predict the results in advance); UEFA will want to avoid repeats of the likes of Argentina v Peru, West Germany v Austria or Spain v Malta.

[Dodge]

20 is awkward as UEFA will want to avoid the idea of teams knowing what they need to do on the last day (because another country has already finished their group games. Football is a lot more competitive than rugby (where groups of 5 work

You know 20 can be made up of 5 groups of 4 too

[pineapple stu]

I thought of that after posting, yeah! But then you're looking at either dropping just four teams for the last 16, or having two group runners-up not qualifying at all for a last 8. Both a bit untidy, I think.

[legendz]

The RWC in '99 had 5 groups of 4. Groups winners advanced to the quarter-finals and the 5 runner-up + best third team played off for the remaining 3 quarter-final places. Personally I think they should've kept the format but maybe tweaked it that the 4th best group winner took on the 5th placed group winner.

I'm sure expanding to 20 would've been considered anyways before it was agreed on 24. 24 is probably more acceptable because it's been used before in previous world cups for those who voted on it.

[Stuttgart88]

My biggest concern for the international game is the power of the clubs. Unfort that is where the real money at. You only see this week that the Barcelona president (I think) coming out and saying that too much time is spent away at international games. Perhaps Uefa are looking at a longer summer tournament but a shorter qualification process. I for one would be in favour of less friendlies (Reduction by max one to two a year) but offset by an increase in competitive games.

For me, the club game doesnt come close to the international stage.

I agree, and there's a big power struggle going on between the European Clubs Association and UEFA. The contract between UEFA and the ECA is up for renewal soon enough - 2014? This contract essentially sets out how European football is structured. In theory there is little to stop the ECA breaking away into a European Superleague (might even be better than the UCD one) with no release of players for international football. Peter Kenyon, ex-Chelsea and Man U, is rumoured to be trying to encourage a breakaway.

However, the EU / European Commission is very supportive of the status quo (see European White Paper on Sport, 2007). Here the EC falls short of recognising as ubiquitous a "European Model of Sport" which is essentially a system of national leagues with promotion & relegation and solidarity payments - linking big clubs to the smallest amateur clubs in theory, with international club competitions and international country-versus-country competitions. Not all sports follow this model (e.g., the Rabobank Direct Pro rugby league) but the EC is believed to support the European model over the American model. This explains why the EC allows UEFA some leeway in selling the CL's TV rights collectively, for example, despite it being abuse of dominant position / monopolistic behaviour.

Anyway, will the EC exist in 2014?!

Cynics argue that UEFA is just seeking to retain power but having studied this issue I genuinely believe UEFA is acting in the interests of everyone, especially the traditionalists like you and me. By curbing the spending power of big clubs via the Financial Fair Play Rules better balance will be restored to club football in due course (I hope) and the balance of power between the club and international games might be tipped back to where it used to be.

The likely outcome is for the status quo to be maintained, UEFA's fair play rules will take effect (they are actually supported by the ECA) but FIFA - who only have influence over international competitions, rules governing the global transfer system and some degree of influence over rule setting alongside the IFA (via IFAB) but with FIFA changing its membership structure to include lobbyists from the club game. It's thought that Blatter's regime has ultimately cost FIFA the moral authority to govern the game without input from the clubs and they are exploiting this with their breakaway threats. It'll be interesting to see where it all ends up.

[legendz]

My biggest concern for the international game is the power of the clubs. Unfort that is where the real money at. You only see this week that the Barcelona president (I think) coming out and saying that too much time is spent away at international games. Perhaps Uefa are looking at a longer summer tournament but a shorter qualification process. I for one would be in favour of less friendlies (Reduction by max one to two a year) but offset by an increase in competitive games.

For me, the club game doesnt come close to the interational stage.

I wouldn't be too worried for international football. An announcement was made recently about an internation week for qualifiers where teams will play Thursday & SUnday, Friday & Monday and Saturday & Tuesday. November and February friendly dates are to merge and the August date is likely to be axed.


If a European league was formed without UEFA's backing, you'd imagine the Champions League would continue minus the clubs opting out. UEFA would still provide the European Champion for the FIFA World Club Cup.


In any European league, there will only be 3 or 4 challenging for the title. The rest will be also rans. Are supporter of those clubs want to be involved in that if there's no promotion/relegation? There's been crazy talk across the water of ending promotion/relegation full stop.

[ArdeeBhoy]

Ah sure it'll be brilliant.

The ideal cure for Insomnia.

[elroy]

Maybe its just me and maybe im getting old but the thought of Barca, United etc in a European league doesnt appeal to me. For a mad football fan, I dont think Ive watched a full game of CL this season and probably wont until the knock out stage. In my ideal world I would like to see the CL go back to a knockout competition, never going to happen I know. But what makes games like Barca V United great is that in general, those type of games only come round once every couple of years and our real occasions to be savoured. If they played each other twice or more a season that greatness diminishes in a big way. More football is great but only to a point, the greed for money could lead to increased saturation of the game.