thanks for this - i looked at ESPN website and they haven't listed out if anything is being on tv, i'm assuming it will be updated in a few weeks.
Yup, no worries. Last year they even showed matches like Faroe Islands v Malta. They'll definitely show it but its still a long way off.
Still haven't changed my pick...the Dutch are winning Nations League...you saw how close Netherlands were to winning it all but losing to Portugal in the Final? Netherlands are going to be hungry and motivated but just look at how deep their squad is right now
Thursday 3 Germany - Spain Ukraine - Switzerland Friday 4 Italy - Bosnia and Herzegovina Netherlands - Poland Saturday 5 Sweden - France Portugal - Croatia Iceland - England Denmark - Belgium Sunday 6 Switzerland vs Germany Spain vs Ukraine Monday 7 Bosnia and Herzegovina - Poland Netherlands - Italy Tuesday 8 France - Croatia Sweden - Portugal Belgium - Iceland Denmark - England
Thursday 3rd September Latvia 0-0 Andorra Bulgaria 1-1 Republic of Ireland Faroe Islands 3-2 Malta Finland 0-1 Wales Germany 1-1 Spain Moldova 1-1 Kosovo Russia 3-1 Serbia Slovenia 0-0 Greece Turkey 0-1 Hungary Ukraine 2-1 Switzerland Friday 4th September Lithuania 0-2 Kazakhstan Belarus 0-2 Albania Italy 1-1 Bosnia and Herzegovina Netherlands 1-0 Poland Norway 1-2 Austria Romania 1-1 Northern Ireland Scotland 1-1 Israel Slovakia 1-3 Czech Republic Saturday 5th September Gibraltar 1-0 San Marino North Macedonia 2-1 Armenia Azerbaijan 1-2 Luxembourg Cyprus 0-2 Montenegro Estonia 0-1 Georgia Iceland 0-1 England Denmark 0-2 Belgium Portugal 4-1 Croatia Sweden 0-1 France
Not sure if your familiar with all that happened with the Czech team in the days leading up to this, but all things considered the match was way better than it had a right to be. A summary that I gave in another thread:
Sunday 6th September Andorra 0-1 Faroe Islands Wales 1-0 Bulgaria Hungary 2-3 Russia Republic of Ireland 0-1 Finland Slovenia 1-0 Moldova Kosovo 1-2 Greece Malta 1-1 Latvia Serbia 0-0 Turkey Spain 4-0 Ukraine Switzerland 1-1 Germany Monday 7th September Kazakhstan 1-2 Belarus Albania 0-1 Lithuania Austria 2-3 Romania Bosnia and Herzegovina 1-2 Poland Czech Republic 1-2 Scotland Israel 1-1 Slovakia Netherlands 0-1 Italy Northern Ireland 1-5 Norway Tuesday 8th September Armenia 2-0 Estonia Georgia 1-1 North Macedonia Belgium 5-1 Iceland Cyprus 0-1 Azerbaijan Denmark 0-0 England France 4-2 Croatia Luxembourg 0-1 Montenegro San Marino 0-2 Liechtenstein Sweden 0-2 Portugal
Georgia won the first match of the league D playoff. 1-nil over Belarus in Tbilisi. So they are one home win away from Euro 2020.
With Iceland's win over Romania it narrows down a lot how the Euro 2020 groups will look. Group C really looks like a Group of Life now. Either Georgia or North Macedonia will join Holland, Austria and Ukraine. Elsewhere, 4 of the 8 playoff semis are going to extra-time.
I was watching the Latvia-Malta match on ESPN+ today. Malta won its first match in 5 years thanks to a header off a free kick in stoppage time. It turned out to literally be the last kick of the game, and the Maltese players and coaches reacted like they had just won the World Cup! It was very exciting. Later, I saw Luxembourg pull out a 2-1 upset against Montenegro in Podgorica. The win put the Luxembourgers atop the standings in their group, based on their head-to-head series with Montenegro, with remaining games against Cyprus (away) and Azerbaijan (at home). LUX and MNE both have 9 points in the competition, with MNE having a +4 goal difference, compared to +3 for LUX.
A good game to watch as a neutral. Both defenses decided to take the night off I guess. Ukraine "upsetting" Spain 1-0. Did not watch it so not sure how bad Spain played.
For me there is a big winner in this International break. A team hardly anybody is talking about. It's Denmark. They won all their three games with dispatching Iceland and beating England away from home. So far so good but why are they the big winners? It has to do with the FIFA World Rankings and the pot allocation for the World Cup Qualifying Draw which will take place in end November. Thanks to their great international window they virtually overtake the Swiss, the Dutch and the Germans and will be the 8th best UEFA side in the next World Rankings, going to be published next week.The highest ranked 10 sides will be in pot 1 for the draw. The fight for pot 1 looks like this : (still virtually, official rankings will be released on 22 October) 7) Italy........................ 1612 8) Denmark.................1609 9) Germany.................1607 10) Netherlands..........1596 11) Switzerland.......... 1589 The teams that are ranked below Switzerland seem to be out of the battle. They can't make up for the ground in just three games. So it's a battle between those five sides. Here the remaining scedules of the teams in question: 7) ITALY.............................1612 Home Estonia (Friendly) Home Poland (NL) Away Bosnia (NL) 8) DENMARK.................... 1609 Home Sweden (Friendly) Home Iceland (NL) Away Belguim (NL) 9) GERMANY..................... 1607 Home Czech Republic (Friendly) Home Ukraine (NL) Away Spain (NL) 10) NETHERLANDS...........1596 Home Spain (Friendly) Home Bosnia (NL) Away Poland (NL) 11) SWITZERLAND............1596 Away Belguim (Friendly) Home Spain (NL) Home Ukraine (NL) Belguim, France, England, Portugal, Spain and Croatia will be no matter what seeded for the draw. They've done enough to be assured a top 10 ranking in UEFA.
Interesting. I'd barely been following UEFA WCQ with the whole COVID mess and everything. I guess normally the plan was that the Euro results would have had a major impact on the rankings, but... COVID had other plans I guess. Anyway, this is much better than what FIFA used to do in past years when they had the big draw event and forced UEFA to have the draw before Euro qualifying was even done. Looking at the seeds this time around, the groups should be a lot more even than in previous cycles, the only exceptions being whichever group(s) contains Denmark/Switzerland and/or if the Netherlands ends up dropping out of Pot 1.
True, although as you seem to suggest, "normally" the WC qualifying draw was done before the Euros. So a change was intended for this cycle but COVID made us revert back to the usual timing of the WC qualifying draw.
FIFA published today the New World Rankings. And the points predicted by the tool I used tourned out to be right for each team. Let's see what other fights do we have in November for the other pots in World Cup qualifying. Republic of Ireland is currently ranked 20th in UEFA. The last spot that earns pot 2. However several other sides are very close to the Irish and will seek to overtake them. Republic of Ireland 1367 ........................................ Slovakia 1366 Iceland 1361 Northern Ireland 1358 Norway 1356 Romania 1355 Scotland 1346 Interestingly four of those sides that are ranked behind Republic of Ireland do have the playoff finals in November whereas the Irish are out of it. That plays a significant role as the weighting for the qualfiers is much higher than for the Nations League fixtures. That's why even Scotland do have very slim chances to make pot 2. A possible upset against a high ranked Serbian side in the playoff final could earn them a lot of points. Elsewhere, it looks like we have a duel between Greece and Finnland for pot 3. Greece 1408 ..................... Finnland 1402 Luxembourg seems to have sealed pot 4. They are ranked 40th and have a healthy lead of 22 points over Cyprus. Great success for a side that was for long long time considered an absolute minnow in European Football. There will be six pots for the World Cup qualfying draw. Here are the updated Rankings: https://www.fifa.com/fifa-world-ranking/ranking-table/men/#UEFA
Let's look at the remaining fixtures for the teams in contention to grab the last spot in pot 2. REPUBLIC OF IRELAND................1467 Away England (Friendly) Away Wales (NL) Home Bulgaria (NL) Very though schedule. England is completely on another level. Very questionable choice as friendly at this point to be honest. Wales is fighting with Finnland to get promoted to League A. SLOVAKIA......................................1466 Away Northern Ireland (PL) Home Scotland (NL) Away Czech Republic (NL) I would say a moderately difficult programme. A lot will depend on the playoff game against a direct rival for pot 2. ICELAND.........................................1461 Away Hungary (PL) Away Denmark (NL) Away England (NL) Wow. Horrible set of games for Iceland. Everything is away from home where they don't tend to do well. Chances of clinching pot 2 are almost inexistant with such a schedule. Hungary has picked up form lately, Denmark themself is in a fight for pot 1. England is too strong anyways NORTHERN IRELAND...................1458 Home Slovakia (PL) Away Austria (NL) Home Romania (NL) Lenient schedule. Slovakia and Romania are not doing so hot lately. Austria can be inconsistent at times. Two of three games against teams that are opponents for pot 2. So they kind of have a very favorable set of games. NORWAY.........................................1456 Home Israel (Friendly) Away Romania (NL) Away Austria (NL) Doable schedule. The away games will decide Norway's fate. They will probably need at least two wins and a draw in order to have a good Chance for pot 2. ROMANIA.......................................1455 Home Belarus (Friendly) Home Norway (NL) Away Northern Ireland (NL) Doable schedule. They play two other teams in contention for pot 2. SCOTLAND.....................................1446 Away Serbia (PL) Away Slovakia (NL) Away Israel (NL) Bad schedule. Everything is away from home. And they should be absolutely considered underdogs against Serbia. They are only in contention for pot 2 if they pull off an upset in Belgrade. It looks like it will be the winner of the playoffs between Northern Ireland - Slovakia or possible even Norway who cliches pot 2.
Quick update regarding the current situation for the pots for World Cup qualifying. POT 1 It's done and dusted. Switzerland failed to produce the results they needed in order to stay in contention. This means that the following teams will be seeded for the World Cup qualifying draw: France, Belguim, England, Portugal, Spain, Croatia, Italy, Denmark, Germany and the Netherlands. POT 2 Slovakia sealed their place in Pot 2. It's now between Russia (1469), Romania (1458) and Republic of Ireland (1458) for the last berth. Russia has good cards here. Only if they lose with 2 goals away to Serbia and at the same time one of Romania or Republic of Ireland manages to defeat Northern Ireland away respectievely Bulgaria at home by 2 goals they will get overtaken by that team. Note that Romania's previous schedule with Norway was cancelled due to COVID issues in the Norwegian camp. So far no decision has been made yet about the result. Romania might/will get additional points depending the verdict. POT 3 It's now a three horse race for two places between Finnland (1417 - plays Wales away), Bosnia Herzegowina (1415 - plays Italy at home) and Greece (1414 - plays Slovenia at home). Finnland has the best chances. Even a loss by one goal to Wales will push them to 1419 points. It's only if they lose by 2 goals that they are in danger of falling out. Bosnia Herzegowina realistically will try to keep it tight with Italy. If they lose only by one goal to Italy and at the same time Greece wins Slovenia by only one goal, the team of Dzeko and Pjanic will remain still ahead of Greece.
Turkey still has a chance to win Group B3 but they could also get relegated! Right now its looking more like the latter. Serbia winning and Turkey losing so they are 4th as it currently stands with 20 minutes to go.
Russia has really declined from where they were in 2018 and even during the Euro 2020 qualifiers. The WADA ban may well be irrelevant at this rate, because based on current form there’s no way they qualify. On the bright side, as far as I know (?) they will still be in Pot 2 for qualifying since none of their direct rivals for that last spot won today (although Norway with a B/C team almost miraculously got an away win in Austria save for a late equalizer! ).