2018 FIFA World Cup qualification (UEFA)

[J-Mezzy]

Spain beating some team called lichtenstein 7-0..

[J-Mezzy]

Even Wales win big

[Riko]

Italy and Spain in the same group..
However england isn't a top five national team in Europe, at least until they keep choice subpar manager.

[HIF]

Italy and Spain in the same group..
However england isn't a top five national team in Europe, at least until they keep choice subpar manager.

They may not be at the moment but when the seedings were done they were in the top group. If Wales replaced them in the group would you consider that a stronger group? Slovakia were also the highest ranked team in the second pot at the time. England were one of very few teams that won every qualifying game for the euros.

Even you were surprised by how well Italy did in the Euros.

The World cup is for all the international teams in the world to join. Europe has the best teams but the difference in level between European teams is narrowing. There are only a handful of really weak teams. There are many more really weak teams everywhere else in the world. South american teams are also not as great as they used to be and like in Europe the difference between teams is narrowing. They should be mixed with the other American teams who are mostly on the weak side. Which is normal considering many of them have populations smaller than moderate sized cities in the rest of the world.

[J-Mezzy]

UEFA WORLD CUP QUALIFYING - FIRST ROUND - GROUP A
BelarusBelarus
FranceFrance
14:45 ET
Game Details
BulgariaBulgaria
LuxembourgLuxembourg
14:45 ET
Game Details
SwedenSweden
NetherlandsNetherlands
ESPN2
14:45 ET
Game Details
UEFA WORLD CUP QUALIFYING - FIRST ROUND - GROUP B
AndorraAndorra
LatviaLatvia
14:45 ET
Game Details
Faroe IslandsFaroe Islands
HungaryHungary
ESPN3
14:45 ET
Game Details
SwitzerlandSwitzerland
PortugalPortugal
14:45 ET
Game Details
UEFA WORLD CUP QUALIFYING - FIRST ROUND - GROUP H
Bosnia and HerzegovinaBosnia and Herzegovina
EstoniaEstonia
14:45 ET
Game Details
CyprusCyprus
BelgiumBelgium
14:45 ET
Game Details
GibraltarGibraltar
GreeceGreece
ESPN3
14:45 ET
Game Details

Look at these games. Sorry but I see maybe 2 good games there. UEFA is made up of 5 great teams, 3 or 4 good ones, and a pile of crap. Again, sorry but your qualifiers are a joke. Might as well give the good teams automatic spots

[HIF]

UEFA WORLD CUP QUALIFYING - FIRST ROUND - GROUP A
BelarusBelarus
FranceFrance
14:45 ET
Game Details
BulgariaBulgaria
LuxembourgLuxembourg
14:45 ET
Game Details
SwedenSweden
NetherlandsNetherlands
ESPN2
14:45 ET
Game Details
UEFA WORLD CUP QUALIFYING - FIRST ROUND - GROUP B
AndorraAndorra
LatviaLatvia
14:45 ET
Game Details
Faroe IslandsFaroe Islands
HungaryHungary
ESPN3
14:45 ET
Game Details
SwitzerlandSwitzerland
PortugalPortugal
14:45 ET
Game Details
UEFA WORLD CUP QUALIFYING - FIRST ROUND - GROUP H
Bosnia and HerzegovinaBosnia and Herzegovina
EstoniaEstonia
14:45 ET
Game Details
CyprusCyprus
BelgiumBelgium
14:45 ET
Game Details
GibraltarGibraltar
GreeceGreece
ESPN3
14:45 ET
Game Details

Look at these games. Sorry but I see maybe 2 good games there. UEFA is made up of 5 great teams, 3 or 4 good ones, and a pile of crap. Again, sorry but your qualifiers are a joke. Might as well give the good teams automatic spots

Wouldn't be a world cup then would it.

We might as well do away with North American, African, middle East and Asian teams all together and just have a tournament between 8 european teams and 4 south american teams.

[El Turco]

i count at least 8 teams in those games that are better or on par with paraguay and ecuador squads. and at least one of ecuador and paraguay going to qualify virtue of too many teams qualifying from conmebol.

good question would be whether or not slovakia from england's crap group can qualify from conmebol. their squad is as underwhelming as ecuador and paraguay but at least they have a world class player unlike those two.

[Hellcrooner]

Imo there should only be 4 zones for qualification.

1 for Africa 4 spots
1 for the whole of america 9 spots
1 For Europe 14 spots
1 for Australasia. 4 spots


1 extra spot for the winner of a playoff with 1 team from each zone.

Organiser gets detracted from the total of their conference, in the case of russia 13 spots for europe.


Plain and straight.

[J-Mezzy]

i count at least 8 teams in those games that are better or on par with paraguay and ecuador squads. and at least one of ecuador and paraguay going to qualify virtue of too many teams qualifying from conmebol.

good question would be whether or not slovakia from england's crap group can qualify from conmebol. their squad is as underwhelming as ecuador and paraguay but at least they have a world class player unlike those two.

Easily no.

Argentina
Brazil
Chile
Colombia
Uruguay

That's the 5 right there. There is hardly an easy game in conmebol

Colombia had to play

Chile away
Uruguay away
Argentina at home
Brazil away
Ecuador at home
Peru at home Bolivia away
Venezuela at home
Paraguay away

That's 2 easy games. Germany for example will not have 1 tough Game. Spain only Italy.

That's why I say uefa QUALIFIERS suck. Who wants to watch these games? Even Bolivia away is hard. The altitude there is like 5000 meters. Argentina lost 6 0 there last qualifiers. Uefa games include Andorra, and Cyprus, Latvia, Lexisburg, Faroes, etc.

By the way both Ecuador and Paraguay have made it to the knock out stages in recent world cups. I don't see any of those weaklings make it past round 1.

Don't get me wrong, top of UEFA is easily the best but it's like the Eastern conference. A few top heavy teams and a bunch of scrubs

[J-Mezzy]

https://www.theguardian.com/football/blog/2016/sep/06/south-american-world-cup-qualifiers-lionel-messi-neymar?CMP=share_btn_tw

[HIF]

i count at least 8 teams in those games that are better or on par with paraguay and ecuador squads. and at least one of ecuador and paraguay going to qualify virtue of too many teams qualifying from conmebol.

good question would be whether or not slovakia from england's crap group can qualify from conmebol. their squad is as underwhelming as ecuador and paraguay but at least they have a world class player unlike those two.

Easily no.

Argentina
Brazil
Chile
Colombia
Uruguay

That's the 5 right there. There is hardly an easy game in conmebol

Colombia had to play

Chile away
Uruguay away
Argentina at home
Brazil away
Ecuador at home
Peru at home Bolivia away
Venezuela at home
Paraguay away

That's 2 easy games. Germany for example will not have 1 tough Game. Spain only Italy.

That's why I say uefa QUALIFIERS suck. Who wants to watch these games? Even Bolivia away is hard. The altitude there is like 5000 meters. Argentina lost 6 0 there last qualifiers. Uefa games include Andorra, and Cyprus, Latvia, Lexisburg, Faroes, etc.

By the way both Ecuador and Paraguay have made it to the knock out stages in recent world cups. I don't see any of those weaklings make it past round 1.

Don't get me wrong, top of UEFA is easily the best but it's like the Eastern conference. A few top heavy teams and a bunch of scrubs

If you think that any South American team could play in UEFA tournament and top their groups you are most probably wrong. South American teams only do well in South America. You spoke about England earlier yet only Brazil have a winning record against England and even then they haven't done well in the 2000's against us. Many south american teams have never beaten England and that includes Colombia and Ecuador who are top 4 at the moment.

[Riko]

Italy and Spain in the same group..
However england isn't a top five national team in Europe, at least until they keep choice subpar manager.

They may not be at the moment but when the seedings were done they were in the top group. If Wales replaced them in the group would you consider that a stronger group? Slovakia were also the highest ranked team in the second pot at the time. England were one of very few teams that won every qualifying game for the euros.

Even you were surprised by how well Italy did in the Euros.

The World cup is for all the international teams in the world to join. Europe has the best teams but the difference in level between European teams is narrowing. There are only a handful of really weak teams. There are many more really weak teams everywhere else in the world. South american teams are also not as great as they used to be and like in Europe the difference between teams is narrowing. They should be mixed with the other American teams who are mostly on the weak side. Which is normal considering many of them have populations smaller than moderate sized cities in the rest of the world.

To be fair, before Verratti and Marchisio injury, I had Italy in the final. Then with De Rossi and T.Motta in the midfield i was skeptical.
Second, I'm not saying England is a bad team, only you guys haven't the right mind set to win. In qualifier and friendly maybe, but when come the real deal you simply bust... I blame the enviroment and some "stars".

[El Turco]

colombia can win less than half those games and still qualify, in fact last wc there were 2 teams from conmebol that failed to win at least half their games and still qualified. i dont know many top level tournaments around the world that lets you qualify without winning at least half your games, funny enough that does remind me eastern conference of previous year where bunch of sub. 500 teams made playoffs. argentina also easily qualified despite losing to bolivia, meanwhile slip up in winters of kazakhstan or latvia much more harder to overcome. and thats the point, margin of error is much smaller in europe. thats why you rarely see bad teams from europe qualifying, even lesser european teams like bulgaria, sweden, croatia, turkey, portugal all went far in world cups while conmebol teams maxed out in quarters outside of brazil and argentina.

actually i dont mind 5 conmebol teams in but they gotta work little harder to get there, concacaf merger would solve that but alas money talks.

[El Turco]

If you think that any South American team could play in UEFA tournament and top their groups you are most probably wrong. South American teams only do well in South America. You spoke about England earlier yet only Brazil have a winning record against England and even then they haven't done well in the 2000's against us. Many south american teams have never beaten England and that includes Colombia and Ecuador who are top 4 at the moment.

our south american friend seems to be confused by sheer size of europe. when you have 52 members in anything you are bound to have some bad quality,there are still 30+ teams in europe that would have at least a decent shot at qualifying in other confederations. kinda like just because there are small fish in the ocean, doesnt mean it is safe to swim around sharks.

[Baphomet]

HIF and Turco agreeing on something has me genuinely shook

[J-Mezzy]

Venezuela beating Argentina 2 0.

No easy games brother

[CalamityX12]

Just because Europe has 50+ countries to contend with, doesn't mean the quality is on par each game.

[El Turco]

best team in the confederation losing to venezuela..entire continent should be banned from world cup imo

[HIF]

Venezuela beating Argentina 2 0.

No easy games brother

France draw against Belarus

Portugal lose to Switzerland

Poland draw with Kazakstan.

Same can be said anywhere.

All teams are moving towards the mean.

[HIF]

Seems the big in south america are on a decline too.