2022 Nations League - Group B1

[Insidetherock]

Basically if we win both our remaining games, we have a possibility to be the best second placed team and the best second placed team is a 2nd seed for the group stages for the euros.

If we finish second in the group, we are almost guaranteed to have a playoff to fall back on - but we are still likely to get one if we finish 3rd

Meanwhile the chance of us getting a playoff place if we finish 4th is minuscule (the highest ranked 4th team would go to playoff if no League C or League D teams qualified directly. But realistically, there’s always one or two.

Yep, that's about the size of it.

Best case scenario in September is beat Scotland and Armenia - assured second I reckon

Draw with Scotland, beat Armenia.. hope Scotland get no more than a point from the 2 Ukrainian games - second based on H2H with Scotland

Finish 3rd and hope the qualifiers fall our way to get at least a play off

Worst case.. finish last and drop down to C.. arrghhh

[Insidetherock]

Edited post to update mistake earlier


On current UEFA rankings lets imagine that teams qualify according to their rankings.. so, the top 20 qualify

Belgium, France, England, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Netherlands, Denmark, Switzerland, Croatia, Wales, Sweden, Serbia, Poland, Ukraine, Czech Republic, Austria, Scotland, Hungary, Norway

Along with Germany as hosts, and excluding Russia who will likely still be banned by the time the draw takes place



If the playoffs were to be allocated based on the tables this morning

The non qualified teams from Path A would be:

Zero

But, this creates an anomaly that I will bring up in a minute.




The non qualified teams from Path B

Ireland, Armenia

Isreal, Iceland, Albania

Bosnia, Montenegro, Finland, Romania

Slovenia


The play offs for this path would then be

Israel, Bosnia,

But, this where the anomaly kicks in.

The next two non qualified teams in B, are Iceland and Ireland.

So,

Israel, Bosnia, Iceland, Montenegro

But there are still no teams gone up to A... so you might imagine, the next four again would go up to make up the A play off (like Ireland, N Ireland and Slovakia did last time, to compete with Iceland)

And the next four currently are..

Ireland, Albania, Finland, Romania


But..

The Isrealis and Bosnians would have a good argument for saying that the A path like this, is actually an easier pathway to qualify, than the B pathway (its full of 3/4 place teams, while the B path has 1/2nd placed teams)

So, I think Israel would be pushed up as the 1st place team in A.. and Bosnia as the first placed team in B

Making the A play off

Isreal, Albania, Finland, Romania

And the B play off

Bosnia, Iceland, Ireland, Montenegro


Complicated eh

[pineapple stu]

Something similar happened for Euro 2020 - only one League A team (Iceland) failed to qualify automatically, and they were joined by three League C teams in the League A play-off. So Hungary - who qualified - technically had an easier route than Slovakia, who had to get past a set of League B teams.

[Eirambler]

Probably there will be at least one League A team that won't make it automatically, Austria or Wales or someone like that. So the weaker performing B teams will then get bumped up to play against them as happened last time. The other disadvantage of a third place Nations League finish would be that it will probably be an away playoff semi final for us, as happened against Slovakia last time.

[Insidetherock]

Something similar happened for Euro 2020 - only one League A team (Iceland) failed to qualify automatically, and they were joined by three League C teams in the League A play-off. So Hungary - who qualified - technically had an easier route than Slovakia, who had to get past a set of League B teams.

The argument there though, was that Hungary would have had to get past the A team, Iceland

[Insidetherock]

Probably there will be at least one League A team that won't make it automatically, Austria or Wales or someone like that. So the weaker performing B teams will then get bumped up to play against them as happened last time. The other disadvantage of a third place Nations League finish would be that it will probably be an away playoff semi final for us, as happened against Slovakia last time.

Yeah, would be surprised if every A team got through, especially now there are going to be some big fish swimming in the second seed pots too (England, France etc)

Wales without Bale are a vastly different side too.. and Switzerland seem to be in a down cycle

[pineapple stu]

The argument there though, was that Hungary would have had to get past the A team, Iceland

Yeah, it was a bit unusual too in that Iceland aren't really a League A team any more.

A side like Hungary would be an easy tie for a proper League A side like, I don't know, England

[Insidetherock]

Yeah, it was a bit unusual too in that Iceland aren't really a League A team any more.

A side like Hungary would be an easy tie for a proper League A side like, I don't know, England

A but they were then in fairness

[pineapple stu]

Well even then they weren't really; I know they were there in merit but they were outclassed like no other side in the league.

But yeah, while in this case Hungary had an easier draw, you're right that in general it should be the League A side who benefits, and Hungary, who didn't even win League C, should be happy to have the back door option at all

[Insidetherock]

Were currently ranked 25th in UEFA in the FIFA rankings.. so we're there or thereabouts..

Been learning German a few years now.. will be gutted if we dont make it

[geysir]

Well even then they weren't really; I know they were there in merit but they were outclassed like no other side in the league.

But yeah, while in this case Hungary had an easier draw, you're right that in general it should be the League A side who benefits, and Hungary, who didn't even win League C, should be happy to have the back door option at all

Thats technical talk, in reality Hungary had a good team, just scraped through the play off final with 2 late goals and entered a really tough group in th euros where they acquited themselves well. They were a much better team than their C league status indicated as is also evidenced in the current league A

[Insidetherock]

You'll get anomalies like that now and again.. weren't Serbia in the C group last time too

[geysir]

You'll get anomalies like that now and again.. weren't Serbia in the C group last time too

Is that Serbia who were a mile and a half ahead of us?
Hungary are not just any molly, we are looking over a 4 year period where they qualified for euro 2020 and did well in the Euros in an actual group of death, then topped their League B group and are now in League A topping the table. If Ireland had that anomaly, Kenny would be sainted for eternity. Sometimes Irish fans are ridiculous in their condescension about the merits other European teams and totally blind to where we stand in the scheme of things.

[tetsujin1979]

Ukraine leading Armenia 1-0, second half underway
Live updates here
https://www.uefa.com/uefanationsleag...ia-vs-ukraine/

[CSAD]

Just further shows how royally we ****ed up in Yerevan?

[pineapple stu]

2-0 now. That would mathematically end any remote chances of us winning the group, though it does at least mean that a draw on Tuesday is all we need to stay up.

[CSAD]

Although if we beat Scotland tonight and Ukraine win on Tuesday we will then surely be in pot 2 for the Euros as long as we do the business against Armenia.

[pineapple stu]

5-0 Ukraine now.

So were Scotland scintillating in beating Ukraine 3-0?

Or was the 1-0 defeat in Yerevan simply one of our worst performances in recent years (which is saying a lot!)?

Or is football just a weird game?

Surely there's no way we can lose on Tuesday at least. Right?

[Eirambler]

That's Ukraine's second string as well. If Kenny leaves us short in midfield again like he did over in Armenia we can absolutely lose to them again. Provided he plays with a proper midfield three we will beat them comfortably, as we would have done in Yerevan also had he set the team up correctly that day.

[JR89]

Although if we beat Scotland tonight and Ukraine win on Tuesday we will then surely be in pot 2 for the Euros as long as we do the business against Armenia.

Would need Norway to beat Serbia or draw with Serbia depending on their result against Sweden today. Can't see Sweden getting a result away to Serbia but we've a +2 goal difference as it stands.