France to feature in Euro 2016 Qualifiers

Banjaxed82

http://www.teamtalk.com/republic-of-ireland/9130130/Hosts-to-feature-in-qualifiers

WTF?!

GLaDOS

Les Bleus will retain automatic tournament qualification, with their group-stage contests serving as friendlies where no points will be awarded.

...So they won't really be qualifying.

Why bother putting them in a group

Banjaxed82

What's the point? Seems like just giving 'Billy no mates' a game so he doesn't feel left out. I'm sure Platini had nothing to do with that. Would they have afforded the same scenario to another host nation?

Fckin weird. France feeling like right gooseberries for the qualification.

cathalio11

Maybe this is to prevent what happened to Poland happening again.

Poland were a very good side who lost complete match sharpness in the 2 years leading up to the Euros that they hosted. That being said, the very same could still happen to France with this rule change, but perhaps the main difference is in the co-efficient ranking.

Poland dropped immensely and are lowly seeded because of all the friendlies they played. So if the Fifa rankings count with France in the build up, this may actually be a good thing.

GLaDOS

Fair point. Friendlies do count though, just not as much as competitive games. If these are just going to be friendlies I can't see how it'll make a difference.

dreamers75

cathalio11 wrote: »

Maybe this is to prevent what happened to Poland happening again.

Poland were a very good side who lost complete match sharpness in the 2 years leading up to the Euros that they hosted. That being said, the very same could still happen to France with this rule change, but perhaps the main difference is in the co-efficient ranking.

Poland dropped immensely and are lowly seeded because of all the friendlies they played. So if the Fifa rankings count with France in the build up, this may actually be a good thing.

Poland were **** 2 years before, were **** 2 years after it.

This is give france some meaningful games to keep their rankings.

cathalio11

ScienceNerd wrote: »

Fair point. Friendlies do count though, just not as much as competitive games.

Oh yes, I am aware. Though if I can recall correctly, they are worth pittance.

Banjaxed82

dreamers75 wrote: »

Poland were **** 2 years before, were **** 2 years after it.

This is give france some meaningful games to keep their rankings.

But they won't be meaningful. Nobody's playing for points, so they'll just be friendlies. I don't see what Uefa is trying to do here...

titan18

If it's for coefficient reasons, it makes sense since host countries can get screwed by it. Only other reason is if qualification groups didn't make sense numbers wise without them with the move up to 24.

GLaDOS

greendom wrote: »

Would the teams playing against France not be playing for points ?

Says no points will be awarded

weldoninhio

greendom wrote: »

Would the teams playing against France not be playing for points ?

WHAT?!??

greendom

ScienceNerd wrote: »

Says no points will be awarded

Beat me to my deletion. I should read the article before commentating

irishmover

Also like to note that UEFA are discussing a 'Nations League' where all 54 UEFA nations will create a 9 division league and ultimate winner will win a prize.

How the **** will they work that one out?

alchemist33

weldoninhio wrote: »

WHAT?!??

Indeed. In the middle of a qualification campaign, other countries will be forced to play a friendly against France. They might have played friendlies in those slots anyway but at least they could have chosen their opponents.

But the critical thing to note here is that it's France, who never ever get anything in their favour.

bren2001

I dont see how this is in Frances favour. The games will count as friendlies so wont change their Fifa or Uefa ranking. They will still slip down like any other team.

If anything, it is a hindrance, they will have to go the wonders or Kazakhstan or so. If they arranged their own friendlies it would be against much better opposition.

ArmaniJeanss

bren2001 wrote: »

I dont see how this is in Frances favour. The games will count as friendlies so wont change their Fifa or Uefa ranking. They will still slip down like any other team.

If anything, it is a hindrance, they will have to go the wonders or Kazakhstan or so. If they arranged their own friendlies it would be against much better opposition.

Theres no slots for friendlies during qualifying this time, theres 10 dates set aside and everyone will play a qualifier on each of those 10 dates - previously there were 12/13 dates available and you could agree with the other teams in the group which dates to use, also negotiate when you wanted home matches etc. For this campaign its all assigned by the UEFA computer to the 10 game days.

So the only option for France for friendlies on those 10 dates would have been nonEuropean opposition which may have been difficult to organise.

So what UEFA have done makes some small bit of sense when looked at that way.

Oranage2

Won't it be a little unfair in those two game international week, you will have teams resting players against France.

ronjo

Oranage2 wrote: »

Won't it be a little unfair in those two game international week, you will have teams resting players against France.

Ah thats just looking for problems for the sake of it.
If they didnt do this then the other teams would have a 5 team group instead of 6 and could quite easily have a friendly on the France fixture day anyway.

loobylou

So will yellow cards/suspensions carry forward?

razorblunt

I'd send out the 11 uncapped players to play against them!

Benimar

It would make more sense if the games did count. Leave France compete as if they needed to qualify, but guarantee them a place.

If France top the group the 'Group Winners' spot goes to the runner up. If France finish 3rd for example, they still qualify along with whoever tops the group.

This would mean that the other teams would have to treat the games against France seriously as it counts against that teams results in the group.

dsmythy

irishmover wrote: »

Also like to note that UEFA are discussing a 'Nations League' where all 54 UEFA nations will create a 9 division league and ultimate winner will win a prize.

How the **** will they work that one out?

Replacement of friendlies.

irishmover

dsmythy wrote: »

Replacement of friendlies.

So the league will run for years then?

ArmaniJeanss

Benimar wrote: »

It would make more sense if the games did count. Leave France compete as if they needed to qualify, but guarantee them a place.

If France top the group the 'Group Winners' spot goes to the runner up. If France finish 3rd for example, they still qualify along with whoever tops the group.

This would mean that the other teams would have to treat the games against France seriously as it counts against that teams results in the group.

Nah, this would be bad as France will be experimenting with players as they are guaranteed qualification, so they wouldn't play their strongest team in all games. You really need all teams to have the same risk/reward situation at the start for a fair sporting contest (obviously near the end of any group you can get situations where some teams have given up and others have eased off as they've already qualified but this cant really be avoided).

ronjo

ArmaniJeanss wrote: »

Nah, this would be bad as France will be experimenting with players as they are guaranteed qualification, so they wouldn't play their strongest team in all games. You really need all teams to have the same risk/reward situation at the start for a fair sporting contest (obviously near the end of any group you can get situations where some teams have given up and others have eased off as they've already qualified but this cant really be avoided).

I agree..... and where would France be seeded??
Happy days if they were the number one seed in our group.

Not so happy if they were number six seed and it ruined our chances of being the highest ranked 3rd place team.

bucketybuck

It might seem a strange move and people can't see the good reasons for doing it, but on the flip side, there don't really seem to be any reasons against it either.

There is a group with only 5 teams in it whereas as every other team has six. Might as well let France make up the numbers if it doesn't do any real harm to anyone.

keeponhurling

looking forward to France playing friendlies against Kazakhstan or San Marino.

They'd be better off playing matches in France against decent opposition in front of big crowds.

yohan the great

alchemist33 wrote: »

Indeed. In the middle of a qualification campaign, other countries will be forced to play a friendly against France. They might have played friendlies in those slots anyway but at least they could have chosen their opponents.

But the critical thing to note here is that it's France, who never ever get anything in their favour.

This is a hindrance to France if anything. Instead of playing teams like Brazil in money spinning friendlies they will be playing against the likes of the Faroes

dsmythy

irishmover wrote: »

So the league will run for years then?

Four years each yes.

TheDoc

Complete rubbish. What team in the middle of actual qualification is going to play a relevant team against France?

The "idea" behind it is to give France some competitive games, when in fact all they will get is....friendlies and unmeaningful games.

Complete backfire and absolute terrible logic from UEFA. Shock horror France are the first to try it out : /

tigger123

I think this debate started after France were knocked out of the 2002 World Cup with no goals scored whatsoever. The argument being that those teams that have no qualification process at all are going to suffer due to a lack of killer instinct in the actual tournament

Makes sense IMO. I doubt it has anything to do with Platini being French.

tigger123

Perhaps a better approach would have been to guarantee their qulaification, but their seeding in the group at the finals would be determined by the "qualification" process.

ronjo

tigger123 wrote: »

I think this debate started after France were knocked out of the 2002 World Cup with no goals scored whatsoever. The argument being that those teams that have no qualification process at all are going to suffer due to a lack of killer instinct in the actual tournament

Makes sense IMO. I doubt it has anything to do with Platini being French.

Its a logical idea.
There are now 54 teams in UEFA since Gibraltar came in so this is the first time it totally made sense.

People who complain about it are just looking for an excuse to bash UEFA and/or Platini.

bucketybuck

TheDoc wrote: »

Complete rubbish. What team in the middle of actual qualification is going to play a relevant team against France?

The "idea" behind it is to give France some competitive games, when in fact all they will get is....friendlies and unmeaningful games.

Complete backfire and absolute terrible logic from UEFA. Shock horror France are the first to try it out : /

So the idea is of no benefit to France, fair enough. But what is the harm done? There are no reasons for, but are there actually any reasons against?

Corholio

ronjo wrote: »

Its a logical idea.
There are now 54 teams in UEFA since Gibraltar came in so this is the first time it totally made sense.

People who complain about it are just looking for an excuse to bash UEFA and/or Platini.

I don't think anyone has had to look for an excuse for that in about 20 years.

Dempsey

Club Football slowly eroding away international football. Another nail this is

Its a terrible idea imo

Lukker-

It's not a big deal really when you think about.

France would be going into it with far less games played then everyone else otherwise, because they can't organise friendlies in the competitive slots.

All it means is teams have to play a friendly when every other team can play a competitive match. It'd definitely help a team like Ireland because it gives management more time to see what works and what doesn't and if certain players need a rest then they can just sit it out.

Fr Tod Umptious

Dempsey wrote: »

Club Football slowly eroding away international football. Another nail this is

Its a terrible idea imo

I don't know what club football has to do with it ?

As another poster pointed out, with the new scheduling it would leave France playing non European opposition most of the time.

The down side for France is that it takes away their control of who they play in the majority of friendlies

Dempsey

Fr Tod Umptious wrote: »

I don't know what club football has to do with it ?

As another poster pointed out, with the new scheduling it would leave France playing non European opposition most of the time.

The down side for France is that it takes away their control of who they play in the majority of friendlies

Reduced slots for international football is down to demands from clubs and the time players spend on international duty has been reduced significantly in recent years because of deals made with the clubs

Laois_Man

Has nobody realized this is potentially disasterous for Ireland

We were occupying the last slot in the second seed pot....with France included, wouldn't we be pushed down to the third seed pot?

ArmaniJeanss

Laois_Man wrote: »

Has nobody realized this is potentially disasterous for Ireland

We were occupying the last slot in the second seed pot....with France included, wouldn't we be pushed down to the third seed pot?

Nope, France will take the '6th seed' slot in the group with only five teams.
So the seedings above remain unaffected.

The Cush

keeponhurling wrote: »

looking forward to France playing friendlies against Kazakhstan or San Marino.

Tried to post here at the time but just got access earlier.

France won't be playing against any of the Pot 6 teams - Luxembourg, Kazakhstan, Liechtenstein, Faroe Islands, Malta, Andorra, San Marino, Gibraltar as they will be drawn in the first 8 groups. France will be playing against the 5 teams in the 9th and last Group (Group I).

The top seeds in Group I will be either Portugal, Greece, Russia or Bosnia-Herzegovina

Hosts France qualify automatically and will play centralised friendlies in accordance with the Week of Football match schedule against teams from the five-team qualifying group.

This scheduling format for the European Qualifiers for both UEFA EURO 2016 and the 2018 World Cup entails matches being played from Thursday to Tuesday. Kick-off times will be largely set at 18.00CET and 20.45CET on Saturdays and Sundays and at 20.45CET for Thursdays, Fridays, Mondays and Tuesdays. On double-header matchweeks, sides will play on Thursday and Sunday, or Friday and Monday, or Saturday and Tuesday

UEFA EURO 2016/European Qualifiers calendar (and France centralised-friendlies' dates)
Matchday 1: 7–9 September 2014
Matchday 2: 9–11 October 2014
Matchday 3: 12–14 October 2014
Matchday 4: 14–16 November 2014
Matchday 5: 27–29 March 2015
Matchday 6: 12–14 June 2015
Matchday 7: 3–5 September 2015
Matchday 8: 6–8 September 2015
Matchday 9: 8–10 October 2015
Matchday 10: 11–13 October 2015
Play-off first leg: 12–14 November 2015
Play-off second leg: 15–17 November 2015
Final tournament draw: 12 December 2015
Final tournament (France): 10 June–10 July 2016

Friendly matches (non-centralised) dates
4-6 September 2014
13, 17-18 November 2014
26, 30-31 March 2015
11, 15-16 June 2015
13, 17 November 2015

jmayo

alchemist33 wrote: »

Indeed. In the middle of a qualification campaign, other countries will be forced to play a friendly against France. They might have played friendlies in those slots anyway but at least they could have chosen their opponents.

But the critical thing to note here is that it's France, who never ever get anything in their favour.

I think if we got to play them in Dublin, and if it is only a friendly with no points at stake and cards not counting either, then we should get every player to try and handle the ball into the net.
What could they do to us ?

I think it would be just a long awaited two fingers from Ireland to UEFA, FIFA and the smug shytes like platini and blatter.

Captain Havoc

jmayo wrote: »

I think if we got to play them in Dublin, and if it is only a friendly with no points at stake and cards not counting either, then we should get every player to try and handle the ball into the net.
What could they do to us ?

I think it would be just a long awaited two fingers from Ireland to UEFA, FIFA and the smug shytes like platini and blatter.

I think it's time to let go of Henry's handball, it was almost five years ago.

bucketybuck

jmayo wrote: »

I think if we got to play them in Dublin, and if it is only a friendly with no points at stake and cards not counting either, then we should get every player to try and handle the ball into the net.
What could they do to us ?

I think it would be just a long awaited two fingers from Ireland to UEFA, FIFA and the smug shytes like platini and blatter.

No, it would just make us look like a bunch of chumps.

jmayo

Captain Havoc wrote: »

I think it's time to let go of Henry's handball, it was almost five years ago.

NEVER and this is from an Arsenal fan.

BTW I bet a fair few people here remember the night the cheatin Belgians robbed us ?

bucketybuck wrote: »

No, it would just make us look like a bunch of chumps.

Nah it would be p*sstake for fecks sake.

ArmaniJeanss

jmayo wrote: »

I think if we got to play them in Dublin, and if it is only a friendly with no points at stake and cards not counting either, then we should get every player to try and handle the ball into the net.
What could they do to us ?

I think it would be just a long awaited two fingers from Ireland to UEFA, FIFA and the smug shytes like platini and blatter.

I know you weren't serious but theres a few flaws.

Red cards in friendlies can actually lead to competitive bans.
Also probably best not to piss off UEFA as we are bidding for Euro 2020.

greendom

jmayo wrote: »

NEVER and this is from an Arsenal fan.

BTW I bet a fair few people here remember the night the cheatin Belgians robbed us ?



Nah it would be p*sstake for fecks sake.

Let it go man !!!