Sweden are slight but certainly not overwhelming favourites (assuming we’re able to field our best for once). They have a few more star players across top leagues (Isak, Lindelof, Forsberg, and Kulusevski to our Soucek and Schick), but overall both sides are relatively equal on paper. It’s more so their playing style that makes them difficult for anyone: an extremely efficient counterattacking 4-4-2 that can win with minimal possession and defends well in organized blocks. Admittedly, probably the most effective way to play against us.
Sweden have really lost some form lately so this is likely the best time to have to take them on. This draw is favorable for us because honestly if we can't beat any of those 3 teams in our group, we'd get trounced at the world cup. Hoping Czech, Scotland, and Portugal make it through these playoffs.
Jankto played a few minutes coming back from injury last weekend, should be on course for full fitness by the playoff.
official nations league draw. We avoid the group of death, and have switzerland in our group so we actually have a chance at avoiding relegation.
I love this draw for us. Unfamiliar opponents that we haven’t played recently (a very long time in the case of Portugal and Switzerland) with a somewhat realistic chance to avoid relegation. To account for the World Cup being held in November / December, the FIFA schedule is altered this year, so we actually play four games in June which will create a tournament feel to the competition during that window. I’m very excited for this Nations League campaign.
Interesting group, lots of practice for game planning the type of opponents we need to get results from in qualifying etc.
📸 České reprezentantky absolvovaly první trénink po příletu do Los Angeles! 🏙🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/iQuS3M5pEv— Česká fotbalová reprezentace (@ceskarepre_cz) February 15, 2022 Our women's team arrived in the US to play an invitational tournament. I imagine the hosts will absolutely demolish us in the fist match Thursday, but they will have more reasonable matches against Iceland and New Zealand.
Yea they are playing up in Dallas. If my car didn't get backed into last week, I would've driven up to watch them. They should hopefully beat iceland.
I was wrong, they managed a draw against USWNT, which has to almost fell like a win. Tremendous effort.
Unfortunately, I think it’s almost safe to rule out both Provod and Kudela at this point. Both will be returning from long-term injuries and limited to basically no proper match practice. I’d maybe call up Kudela if he featured before then (due to our issues in that position), but that’s still a stretch considering this injury reportedly had him contemplating retirement all together. In terms of newcomers, Krejci II should be called up if healthy (he’s admittedly already quite injury prone), while Kral shouldn’t have a guaranteed roster spot anymore. Kuchta is now the clear backup and replacement for Schick going forward.
Obviously it's not the main focus of anyone right now, but apparently Sweden and Poland's football federations are saying they will refuse to travel to Russia. I hope we join them and that Russia is banned from remaining competitions.
The football associations of the Czech Republic, Poland and Sweden demand moving the possible World Cup play-off match from Russia. All three associations made this common decision during Thursday's meeting and informed both FIFA and UEFA about this requirement. https://t.co/umYNUTltIr— Czech Football National Team (@ceskarepre_eng) February 24, 2022 It appears that we have joined the Poles and Swedes in this. I hope all international organizations go further, but that conversation is for the politics forums.
Not really a political discussion because I think it would be ridiculous for any of our players to travel to Russia at this point. As a former USSR controlled nation, we shouldn't be sending any Czechs to Russia. Russia unfortunately should be booted from the qualifying group. Not sure how it will work though.
This should just be a mini tournament between ourselves, Sweden, and Poland for that one World Cup spot. UEFA are requiring the losers of each match to play each other in a friendly on the second available date, so another possibility we have to play Russia anyways.
An update on the Schick situation that doesn’t sound at all favourable for us in my opinion… Bayer Leverkusen have stated that if Schick doesn’t feature before the upcoming international break (last club game is March 20), he won’t be released for international duty. At this point, I’m not expecting him to play for us. I so better be wrong.
Kudela is actually on the bench for Slavia today. Still would be quite short of ideal match practice (if being counted on as a starter), but positive news nonetheless, especially since our other aging centre back didn’t travel to Belgrade for Sparta’s ongoing horror show.
Coufal just had groin surgery out of nowhere and his status for the playoff is unknown, but probably doubtful like Schick… I can’t even remember the last time we had a completely healthy squad with all of our best players present. All I will say for now is that these critical injuries shouldn’t be used as a lifeline for Silhavy’s job security whatsoever. It’s World Cup or bust as far as I’m concerned.
Sweden and Poland have now announced they will refuse to play Russia at all. I imagine we will do the same ultimately. Fifa is about as corrupt as Putin's Russia so I imagine they won't agree to ban Russia. I agree with the boycott in principal, but I because Fifa is a mafia we are just giving them tickets to Qatar. At that point it would be up to other national teams to refuse to play Russia so that Fifa knows having them means not having the teams that draw viewers.
Actually according to Polish sources our FA are being sniveling cowards about this. I hope there is enough backlash to change their minds.
Breaking - FIFA set to suspend Russian teams from international football until further notice. Confirmation of decision expected later today.— Simon Evans (@sgevans) February 28, 2022
Russia is out, I do feel some sympathy for Fedor Smolov who was an early and outspoken critic of the invastion but this had to be done. I also worry for Kuchta and any other Czech players on Russian club teams, not so much personal safety but they signed contracts expecting UEFA competition and a currency that had any international value. I've not seen for sure what the qualification will look like, in Europa League Leipzig were just advanced passed Spartak since it is already into knockouts, but I hope we get to play a mini-group stage since it would still be two matches
I expect we will just do a home and away against both poland and sweden and whomever tops that group of 3 moves on.
Of course our FA still had to hesitate on what should’ve be an easy, automatic decision, but at least FIFA got it right for once. As for how this impacts our playoff path, I think the two leading options are: A) Poland being automatically placed in the final and awaiting the winner of our match with Sweden. B) One of Slovakia or Hungary replace Russia to uphold the original playoff format. A three team mini-tournament could be in play too, but there wouldn’t be time for a home and away with each team.