Euro 2016 Qualifying Draw

I know you can't wait for this one! Draw is Sunday at 11:00 GMT, with coverage on Sky Sports News.

The European Championships have been expanded from sixteen teams, in Euro 2012, to twenty-four teams for Euro 2016. Which makes qualifying a lot easier for the bigger teams.

Very simple format for qualifying really: there are eight groups of six teams, and one group of five. The top two in each group qualify, as do the best third-placed side. The remaining eight third-placed sides have to go through a two legged play-off.

For Television reasons, England, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Holland are guaranteed to be placed in one of the six team groups. France, who have already qualified through being the hosts, will be put into the five team group and will play a friendly match against the inactive team in each round of games.

For political reasons, Spain and Gibraltar (go Gibraltar!) can't be in the same group. And neither can Azerbaijan or Armenia.

Here are the pots:

POT ONE - England, Spain, Germany, Holland, Italy, Portugal, Greece, Russia, Bosnia-Herzegovina.
POT TWO - Ireland, Ukraine, Sweden, Croatia, Hungary, Czech Republic, Denmark, Switzerland, Belgium.
POT THREE - Serbia, Norway, Poland, Turkey, Slovenia, Austria, Romania, Slovakia, Israel.
POT FOUR - Wales, Scotland, Belarus, Estonia, Finland, Armenia, Montenegro, Latvia, Bulgaria.
POT FIVE - Northern Ireland, Macedonia, Cyprus, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Lithuania, Moldova, Albania, Iceland.
POT SIX - Luxembourg, Kazakhstan, Liechtenstein, Gibraltar, San Marino, Andorra, Malta, Faroe Islands.

Best case scenario for Ireland for me, would be.

Greece
Israel
Latvia
Moldova
Gibraltar.

Wouldn't mind getting Macedonia again. 
Great time out there.

England to get Sweden, Poland, Wales, Macedonia and San Marino?

I wish they would just get on with the draw. They don't half drag these draws out.

Ok we are underway and England have come out in Group E.

Gibraltar have been placed in Group D with Germany. They did get drawn out with Spain in Group C but had to be moved.

As predicted England get San Marino. One down four to go.

Boring pot 6. No one cares who they get..

Just get on with it... This isn't the eurovision song contest..

Get in NI. Get Greece. Very beatable..

Nice draw for Wales. Bosnia, Cyprus and Andorra.

Result for wales lol.. Bosina.

going well for the home nations so far.

Estonia are not bad..

Scotland get Gibraltar... and Germany. England are joined by Estonia, Lithuania and San Marino so far.

q

sportform wrote:England to get Sweden, Poland, Wales, Macedonia and San Marino?

I wish they would just get on with the draw. They don't half drag these draws out.

Agree.

Just get on with the damn thing.

The top two in each group qualify with the best third-place team. The other third-place teams go into the playoffs. So good chances for all the home nations to do well.

Scotland have Poland and Germany.. Tough for them

but the others looking very good

Pot 2. Here we go Ireland

Wales have got Belgium with Bosnia, Israel, Cyprus and Andorra. Not too bad.

Ireland Scotland are feicked

Interesting group.

Ireland in with Germany, Poland, Scotland and Gibraltar. A much tougher group.

England with a pretty simple draw..maybe too eaay

England have Switzerland, Slovenia, Estonia, Lithuania and San Marino.

Crunch game with Switzerland for Roy Hodgson.

I
t wont be crunch when both teams look guaranteed to qualify.

dead rubber. Mate

mystiroakey wrote:Ireland Scotland are feicked

Tough group, think we can qualify.

Not gonna be easy.

Fancy the beating of Gibralter & Scotland, home and away.

Have to get home wins v Georgia an Poland.

Germany, write that off as 2 defeats.

Goal difference could well be a factor.

England get a near-perfect draw. No difficult trips there.

May as well book your trip across the Channel for Euro 2016 now.

Wales should get 3rd and a play-off at the least; maybe they could overturn Bosnia to qualify automatically?

Scotland will find it tough. Ireland are in the same situation as Wales; but if they overturn Poland they might get there automatically.

Doable for Northern Ireland as well. Just about.

I feel gutted that we probally wont see Scotland in the euros.

Poland are a really good team mate..

Ireland may sneak in second. If not have a great shot at the play offs.. But i think Scotland could have got it much easier

Nothing group for England. If you can't qualify from that its time to retire

No doubt Roy will go to Estonia and put 10 men behind the ball mind

Still a guaranteed qualification.

Ni and wales have great shots in getting to France..

Suppose you can say who got lucky and who didn't but when we always qualified for big tournaments we were always in the top 2 pots so got relatively easy draws! So despite it being a procession for the big teams you earn it through years of success! Don't underestimate Switzerland though, good side, probably on par with England but experience should see England top. Wales have a good draw except Belgium and Bosnia are free scoring but they should finish third. Getting Germany is the worst side from pot 1, it's good and bad, there's only one team who's definetely worse but then there's only one that is far superior.

It doesn't matter about Switzerland. Its top two garanteed...if those two don't go though i will eat my hat and on paper England are still much the better team, as good as the swiss have become..

You won't actually eat a hat though will ya?   

Yes. If it happens i will

westisbest wrote:

mystiroakey wrote:Ireland Scotland are feicked

Tough group, think we can qualify.

Not gonna be easy.

Fancy the beating of Gibralter & Scotland, home and away.

Have to get home wins v Georgia an Poland.

Germany, write that off as 2 defeats.

Goal difference could well be a factor.

If we lose home and away to Ireland it's time to quit international football, without Keane the Republic's team is no better than ours. Pretty much their two best players are Scottish, they will both recieve quite a welcome at Hampden   

Monty mate Georgia are also half decent. You couldn't have got it harder. But good luck to you... There is still a chance for you..never give up..

i really like bannan at palace . And fletcher is half decent. You have a few other midfielders. If you can get possession you have a sniff

England's group is the most mind numbingly boring group I've ever seen. Not one  exciting match up. ITV or whoever  has the coverage will struggle to make these fixtures a must watch.

What would you say is the hardest group?

Expanding the competition to 24 makes it a bit of a joke like the Rugby World Cup. Remember how catastrophically bad the Irish were last time out? Now we'll have 8 teams that badand worse in the competition.

It's like the Vanessa Mae, Mexican Prince situation in the Olympics. Pointless

Yep. I wont be bothered about missing them that's for sure..

Never said it wasn't a tough one mysti, it sure is, if we get off to a rotten start again then we have no chance. Georgia out of the whole group imo is the worst part, they basically cost us a place at Euro 2008 and are very good at home. As i said though you can't complain if you are in pot 4, your there for a reason and you have to get yourself out of it through good wins and a long term plan not hoping for some fluke miracle draw. Having said that how the hell were Hungary in pot 2 ..

super_realist wrote:Expanding the competition to 24 makes it a bit of a joke like the Rugby World Cup. Remember how catastrophically bad the Irish were last time out? Now we'll have 8 teams that badand worse in the competition.

It's like the Vanessa Mae, Mexican Prince situation in the Olympics. Pointless

Even worse, when the tournament itself begins the teams will be divided into eight groups of three, I believe, with the top two going on to the last 16.

A long drawn out tournament, far removed from Euro 2012, awaits.

monty junior wrote:Never said it wasn't a tough one mysti, it sure is, if we get off to a rotten start again then we have no chance. Georgia out of the whole group imo is the worst part, they basically cost us a place at Euro 2008 and are very good at home. As i said though you can't complain if you are in pot 4, your there for a reason and you have to get yourself out of it through good wins and a long term plan not hoping for some fluke miracle draw. Having said that how the hell were Hungary in pot 2 ..

well truth is - They are 4 very evenly matched teams imo. I would say Poland are just above- but then they are still no heavy weights. Your group will be the most interesting by far.

As said by others. England's is a snoozefest

Any group that Scotland, Rep Ire, Wales , NI find themselves in any qualifying stage is going to be tough because they are very much third, fourth, fifth and sixth rate teams.

Out of that rotten bunch, only really Scotland are showing signs of progress with some decent results and performances lately, they'd still stink out an actual tournament though.

We could play eleven Gareth Barry`s & qualify. Snoozefest is an understatement of this group. As for the main tournament, wake me up for the QF`s, that's when the first games of quality will begin.

super_realist wrote:Any group that Scotland, Rep Ire, Wales , NI find themselves in any qualifying stage is going to be tough because they are very much third, fourth, fifth and sixth rate teams.

Out of that rotten bunch, only really Scotland are showing signs of progress with some decent results and performances lately, they'd still stink out an actual tournament though.

Has the world gone mad?

Has SR said something nice about his home country.

Good on ya.

Its all about getting there for the real fans mate..and its only in france- I will certainly be over there wathcing a few games- its so close. Its all about the Crack

They shouldn't have expanded it to 24 teams there will be a lot of duff games in the tournament.

I can see they want to give the borderline countries more competitive football and tournament experience bit still.

Don't worry, Euro 2016 isn't as bad as Euro 2020.

At least Euro 2016 will have a home.

mystiroakey wrote:

monty junior wrote:Never said it wasn't a tough one mysti, it sure is, if we get off to a rotten start again then we have no chance. Georgia out of the whole group imo is the worst part, they basically cost us a place at Euro 2008 and are very good at home. As i said though you can't complain if you are in pot 4, your there for a reason and you have to get yourself out of it through good wins and a long term plan not hoping for some fluke miracle draw. Having said that how the hell were Hungary in pot 2 ..

well truth is - They are 4 very evenly matched teams imo. I would say Poland are just above- but then they are still no heavy weights. Your group will be the most interesting by far.

As said by others. England's is a snoozefest

I think so to, the difference with Poland despite being pretty mediocre they have that quality that none of the other teams have in Lewandowski and Blaszczykowski which could make the difference, either one get's injured then it's all to play for.

Duty281 wrote:Don't worry, Euro 2016 isn't as bad as Euro 2020.

At least Euro 2016 will have a home.

What do you mean? Euro 2020 will have a home...

its in the whole of europe dude.