True, although not so bad for Spain and Italy when you look at the other teams in that group. I think both of them will rack-up a lot of points so whoever finishes 2nd is in no real danger of being the worst second-place finisher. Group H I think is more of a battle for second b/w BiH and Greece. I think Group "I" is the most open. Everyone except Finland has a chance to win the group, or at least qualify. Then again we're talking about 2 years from now so take these predictions with a grain of salt.
Yeah some people are seriously overrating Greece here. That Belgium group will be won by Belgium for sure. Greece's qualifying for the Euros has been disastrous. BIH are a good team but Belgium will be too strong over the course of a league.
Favorites? - yes. A few notches? - no way. We too have been doing a good job at developing youth players and a number of senior regulars under the age of 25 will enter their prime when we meet. We currently have 21 players in the German Bundesliga with the transfer window yet to close. Last season no foreign country had more players playing in the Bundesliga. Not even the always popular Brazil and the Bundesliga does not have non-EU restrictions. That's without looking at our players in the other "Big 5" European leagues. A few notches? - no way.
Your right. A few notches is a exaggeration, my only real point is to say that too much is made about Portugals regression. WC14 was poor and qualifying to the WC there were plenty of signs the team could have problems, however when there seems to be a large cluster of amazing youth players coming through, all signs point to Portugal becoming stronger. I mean sure there is no guarantee,but lets say only 1/3 of these guys pull through, its still plenty enough to say we should rebound. Euro 16 they may still be too young but by 2018 we should start to see the positive effects. Of course the qualifying starts before that but should still be enough there. Either way Portugal and Switzerland should be 1 and 2 pretty comfortably, Hungary being the third best team may take points but I cant see them really doing much except being a more distant 3rd.
I do not buy into Belgium. So they have two strong years after a decade of failure. All of a sudden they are world beaters? They represent what is wrong with FIFA rating. Wales in pot 1? Is either of these nations truly better than France or Spain? I do not think so. Iceland in pot 2? I have no problem with Croatia, a proven performer to be in pot 1. Belgium and Wales will need to convince me.
It's not just the past 2 years that people are looking at. Their squad is deep and will get better as they mature. Wilmots still hasn't made the team gel together all that well but that can change if they get a manager that's a better tactician.
Taking about who is gonna be the favorite at 2018 is ridiculous A lot can happen in 3 years Teams like Albania, Paraguay, Panama in recent years have made strides none are even expected to come close to qualifying but in recent years the gap in world football is closing with the exception of very few there is no more elite teams
Paraguay did qualify as recently as 2010, and Panama weren't that far off in 2014. They conceded two goals in stoppage time against the United States in their last game, having led 2-1. If they had just held on for a couple more minutes, they would advanced to the intercontinental playoff instead of Mexico, where they most probably would have beaten New Zealand.
But we are not talking about the Finals we are talking about qualifying, which goes into full swing in just a couple of months, not 3 years.
Greek here. Just another best possible Draw for us, Talking before the start of the EURO 2016 Qualifiers, i could just say "50% Chance we finish 1st,40% chance we finish 2nd , 10% chance we finish 3rd, but now we re in totally bad shape. Still in hope that the whole EURO 16 Qualifiers have been a scheme (fixed games) but nothing can be sure. Technically, noone could believe that a team that was 1 foot away from the Quarterfinals of the WC 2014 would be so bad 1 year later, with the expense of 1 player. Something smells fishy, or it's my Greek-hurt pride speaking. Anyways, Yeah the Group is definately open, we re aiming for 2nd spot. We ve definately have our downs, but nothing worse can come out of that, so we either pick ourselves up and hope we reach our previous game, or we get whiped out of the Worldwide National Football Scene where we were(weren't rocking, but were present) in the last 10 years or so. As many have said Belgium are the favorites, but playing versus very defensive teams like us, Im sure that a draw or even 2, and maybe a lucky 3point grab is possible for us( all this hypothetically if the new coach manages to bring the team to its maximum potential, after 2 bad selections, I believe they themselves have realised that they need to spend a bit more to find something solid). Bosnia have their downs as well I believe, they aren't doing good either at the EURO Qualifiers. What Im literally afraid is Cyprus.