I assume your big eight (judged on July 2006, before the tournament kicked off) would have included Germany, Italy, France, England, Spain, Netherlands and Portugal. Who's eighth?
Only two of those teams reached the semi finals. One of them didn't even qualify.
The test of whether the ninth best team in Europe is equivalent to the 24th? Here's a points table from the qualifiers:
1 Greece 12 10 1 1 31
2 Italy 12 9 2 1 29
2 Czechia12 9 2 1 29
2 Croatia 12 9 2 1 29
5 Romania 12 9 2 1 29
6 Spain 12 9 1 2 28
7 Germany 12 8 3 1 27
8 France 12 8 2 2 26
8 Sweden 12 8 2 2 26
8 Netherlands 12 8 2 2 26
11 Bulgaria 12 7 4 1 25
12 Scotland 12 8 0 4 24
12 Turkey 12 7 3 2 24
12 Russia 12 7 3 2 24
15 England 12 7 2 3 23
15 Israel 12 7 2 3 23
15 Norway 12 7 2 3 23
18 Poland 12 6 4 2 22
19 Portugal 12 5 6 1 21
19 Finland 12 5 6 1 21
21 N Ireland 12 6 2 4 20
21 Denmark 12 6 2 4 20
23 Serbia 12 4 6 2 18
24 Ukraine 12 5 2 5 17
24 R Ireland 12 4 5 3 17
If there are only six qualifying games (as opposed to 10, or in the current tournament 12) it's unlikely anyone will have qualified after three even if they have nine points already. Your group in the current series, with Germany and Czechia dominating from the beginning, is a much better example of lots of dead games.
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