Euro 2020
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I’m not sure that the bookies are keeping up with all the nuances of the Euro 2020 draw procedure.
Two points:
1. One of the Nations League D teams will qualify – its the way it was designed to give smaller nations a chance to improve. So you will have one of Georgia, Kosovo, Macedonia or Belarus qualify from Path D.
2. The hosts are already drawn into their groups, so hosts that qualify (or have the chance to qualify) will be placed into groups. For example England are already paired with Scotland who can qualify via Path C play offs. Scotland or whoever qualify will be 4th seed in England’s group. Its already decided.
So who can get the dream draw of the Path D team (probably Georgia or Kosovo), with potentially 3 teams going through to the quarter finals from each group – this could effectively be a bye into the QF.
As said, England (Group D) are already paired with Scotland – so that is their Pot 4 team. Same with Germany (Group F) and Hungary, Netherlands (Group C) and Romania, Spain (Group E) and Ireland (at the moment).
So that leave Group A (Italy), Group B (Russia, Denmark) and that’s it!
Group B is unusual as the host are in Pots 2 and 3 … and cannot be drawn with another host team, so potentially Ukraine, Belgium or Croatia will be their Pot 1 team. But it can’t be Ukraine (political reasons) and Croatia will probably drop out of Pot 1 provisional position so its very likely they will get Belgium, which wont make it easy on either of them. But could be handy enough for Belgium in a group like Belgium/Russia/Denmark/Georgia.
In short Italy are a top seed, and more likely to get a soft draw than others. Belgium could be in a good position also.
The draws could be very skewed (as discussed considering the League D playoffs). For example England/France/Portugal/Serbia is a possibility for England at the moment.
There has already been a move on Italy on the exch and some bookie’s slow to react. And I think there could be a move on Belgium also especially if Russia and Denmark are confirmed as direct qualifiers and Croatia slip out of provisional Pot 1 ranking (likely to be passed by Spain who have a game in hand on them).
This will completely switch if Ireland beat Denmark and they qualify automatically instead, then the advantage switches to Spain/Ireland hopefully.
Ill be watching in the next round of matches in November if any movements….
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