EURO 2020

[PTAO?]

They should let the top n ranked nations in then have wild cards. Let those play a tournament or groups to qualify without needing to have the farcical games.

Ridiculous. Should we have a European Super League too?

Not that ridiculous when you look at how other sports operate.

[Colly]

Very few sports are as universal as football, where very few countries don't have a national team under FIFA. Seeding major tournaments rather than qualifying just enforces a money making status quo with the stronger teams getting stronger and the weaker sides not getting to improve. In my lifetime England have failed to qualify on plenty of occasions, Holland have several times recently and even Italy failed to qualify for the last World Cup. Letting these sides qualify by default would be horrible.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/49625260

Read that earlier, really interesting. Though as we all know the greatest ever Kosovan footballer was Shefki Kuqi.

[daib0]

[PTAO?]

Very few sports are as universal as football, where very few countries don't have a national team under FIFA. Seeding major tournaments rather than qualifying just enforces a money making status quo with the stronger teams getting stronger and the weaker sides not getting to improve. In my lifetime England have failed to qualify on plenty of occasions, Holland have several times recently and even Italy failed to qualify for the last World Cup. Letting these sides qualify by default would be horrible.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/football/49625260

Read that earlier, really interesting. Though as we all know the greatest ever Kosovan footballer was Shefki Kuqi.

I don't know how old you are, but England have failed twice in my lifetime, both times they were outside the top 10 at the beginning of that year. Same with Italy and Netherlands last year, and in 2016 for Netherlands. Letting these sides qualify by default wouldn't have happened.

[Colly]

At the time of the draw for the last World Cup Holland, Romania and Wales were all in the top ten and would have automatically qualified under your system.

[PTAO?]

How ever would we have lived.
I'd much rather see Germany beat San Marino 13-0 again, that will be much better for the development of smaller nations.

[overseasTOON]

How ever would we have lived.
I'd much rather see Germany beat San Marino 13-0 again, that will be much better for the development of smaller nations.

13-0!

San Marino must have had an off day. Normally they're a top class side as proven by how difficult they were for Scotland to break them down and eventually win 2-0.

[Blue & Maroon]

How ever would we have lived.
I'd much rather see Germany beat San Marino 13-0 again, that will be much better for the development of smaller nations.

It's why the Nations League has been brought in.

Auto qualification will and should never happen. Bringing in a preliminary qualifier might but again I think UEFA have solved the 'problem' for many smaller nations.

[Remember Colo]

I feel so bad for the fans of power nations having to occasionally watch their teams beat up on low seeded opposition...Yes, those matches are boring. But I imagine the fans of those places are still happy to see their team play the best players in the world, and filling those weekends with more meaningless friendlies annoys fans too.

As others have said, the Nations Leagues set up by the continental federations have been a good change of pace to manufacture a sense of competition between qualifying periods, and I suppose they could let some of the top ranked sides skip maybe the first stage of tournament qualifying as federations like CONCACAF do, but it would require a complete overhaul of the UEFA qualifying format.

[bodacious benny]

Woohoo 1-0 Kosovo

[overseasTOON]

No point playing these minnows.

[bodacious benny]

Balls. 1-1.

[Somebodys pinched my sombrero]

No great lover of Sterling, but he’s been unplayable tonight.

[Sir Bobby]

No point playing these minnows.

To be fair...

[bodacious benny]

No point playing these minnows.

Yep

[overseasTOON]

That escalated quickly.

Washed up at 1-1 and then watched the technical challenge on bake off and its 5-1

[Colly]

Game on.

[overseasTOON]

Blimey. Watched the showstopper round and its 5-3 with a saved penalty!

They should play more matches during bake off!

[Remember Colo]

No great lover of Sterling, but he’s been unplayable tonight.

He's really good. Although I can also understand being annoyed by him.

[Blue & Maroon]

What an enjoyable style of football Kosovo play, they'll qualify.