There would be four groups A,B,C,D port 1: Switzerland (assigned to Group A) Austria (assigned to Group B) Greece Nethrlands Port 2: Croatia Italy Czech Republic Sweden Port 3: Romania Germany Portugal Spain Port 4: Poland France Turkey Russia Obviously two teams from the same port can not in the same group and each group would have four teams all from different ports http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_2008 I would post the group results after the draw on Dec 2 (ESPN 2 and ESPN Deportes)
Seems like the placement of the Netherlands, Romania, and France will be the big factors in determining group difficulty. There is a 3 in 16 chance that you have a serious, serious group of death: Netherlands Any pot 2 team Any pot 3 team, except Romania France A group containing the Dutch, Italians, Germans, and French would be epic.
That such a group is even a possibility just boggles the mind. And, on top of that if you get Portugal instead of Germany in there you still have THREE WC semifinalists in one group.
how do they determine the teams in the ports It might be better if UEFA authorities would just make ports as a groups, it is already broken even
Believe it or not there is a method to this madness. According to UEFA: Coefficients The seeded teams will be the host associations, with the reigning European champions if they qualify, and one or two teams with the best coefficients on the basis of results achieved in the 2006 FIFA World Cup qualifying competition and/or in the qualifying competition for the 2006/08 UEFA European Football Championship. The other finalists will be assigned to the four groups by means of a draw, according to their coefficients. And there are a few threads about it on here as well, some excellent...I don't feel like doing your work for you searching for them, though.
Sure, why not. Even if it is random... Group A Switzerland Czech Republic Germany Turkey Group B Austria Croatia Romania France Group C Greece Sweden Portugal Russia Group D(eath) Netherlands Italy Spain Poland
If they had used the FIFA ranking to determine the pots (of course without seeding the hosts or the titleholder) it would look like this: Pot A Italy Spain Germany Czech Republic Pot B France Portugal Netherlands Croatia Pot C Greece Romania Turkey Russia Pot D Poland Sweden Switzerland Austria Nearly perfect, only Sweden is in a wrong Pot, but thats their own fault, because they played more friendlies this year than anyone else. (six instead of three)
My prediction. Focus was on balancing out each group to make for better knockout rounds. Group A Switzerland Czech Republic Portugal France Group B Austria Italy Romania Turkey Group C Netherlands Sweden Spain Russia Group D Greece Croatia Germany Poland
Off the top of my head....: Group A Switzerland Sweden Germany Russia Group B Austria Czech Republic Spain Turkey Group C Greece Croatia Portugal France Group D Netherlands Italy Romania Poland Bold and Italics are teams that will move on. I know, not all as it should be.
And there's no way Netherlands would beat Liechenstein by only 1-0, or lose to Belarus, no way in hell.
And how do you exactly measure objectivity in such a thread? The easiest possible group for Italy would include Austria, Germany, and Russia if you knew anything. Troll harder.
My prediction. Switzerland Sweden Portugal Poland Austria Croatia Germany Turkey Greece Italy Romania France Netherlands Czech Republic Spain Russia
Yet still, the Dutch have the best UEFA coefficient for Euro 2008, and said coefficient is based on the most recent European qualifying campaigns. So as rubbish as we've done, everybody else has done even worse. Funny how that works eh.
How would you guys rate these teams from 1 to 16 according to your knowledge of European football? 1 Italy (Simply the best) 1 Germany (Their coach is a suberb tactician) 3 France (Need a little improvemnet and they would be #1) 4 Spain (They Only get better) 5 Croatia (Always underrated, maybe it is even underrated right not, would surprise us) 5 Portugal (to be at the top they need more team chemistry, talent is there) 7 Chech Rebuplic (That's a team I usually don't watch a lot of) 8 Greece (2004 winner, this team reminds me of a Croatia) 9 Netherland (what is wrong with them, half of a Real Madrid is on that team) 9 Sweden (Something is missing) 11 Romania (don't know much about them) 12 Russia (I have faith in this team) 13 Turkey 14 Poland (Russia could beat Poland) 15 Switzerland (???) 16 Austria (easiest to rank, not a brainer) 4 of these teams I only know them by roster and scores but rest of them I was watching most of their Euro 2008 Qualifiers, so I might need some help