A new competition gets underway on Thursday evening when the inaugural UEFA Nations League begins. That means that the first steps towards Euro 2020 get underway with all eyes on 12 sides who have their destiny in their own hands.
The Nations League is a tournament designed to reduce the amount of meaningless friendlies and have teams of similar ability playing each other in a competitive environment. There are four spots at Euro 2020 at stake.
The Format
The 55 European nations have been split up into four groups A, B C and D. Within each of those groups there are four mini-sections – A1, A2, A3 and A4 and the same for the other groups. Some mini sections have three teams and some have four.
Every team plays the others in their group home and away and at the end of that period the four mini section winners in group A progress to the play-offs to determine the title winner. At the end of the competition teams finishing top of their mini section will go up a group and those finishing bottom drop down one. The highest 16 teams in the Nations League who do not automatically qualify for Euro 2020 will go into a play-off for the final four spots in that tournament.
Overview
One of the good looking things about this competition is that there is plenty to play for no matter what group you are in but only group A teams can win this tournament. For the likes of Wales and Republic of Ireland in group B and Scotland in C this competition is all about a second chance to qualify for Euro 2020, to boost their world ranking which in turn will give them an easier route to qualify for future tournaments and to get promoted to face bigger nations.
The 12 sides in Group A will be the ones battling it out to land this inaugural title with the group matches being played over the next three months ahead of the play-offs to determine the winners in June 2019.
Group A1
The world champions France are in this group and will be expected to make it through to the play-offs as group winners. Germany will not make that easy and the two matches between the last two world champions will be fascinating. The other side in the group are the Netherlands and they look to have their work cut out to avoid dropping to group B which they will do if they finish bottom.
Group A2
World Cup semi-finalists Belgium headline this group and they will be fancied to go all the way in the competition not just win this section. Iceland are seeded to be their main dangers and we’ve seen them go well in Europe recently but in reality we should expect Switzerland to run Belgium the closest in an intriguing group.
Group A3
The defending European champions Portugal are in this group. It remains to be seen whether they give this too much focus. There is a feeling that they will blood their other players rather than subject Cristiano Ronaldo to it. That could play into the hands of Italy who are in this section too while Poland make up the numbers in a competitive threesome.
Group A4
This is the group in which England are in but you would have to say they have it pretty tough and will need their best stuff to avoid relegation down to the B section. They are joined in their group by the World Cup finalists Croatia who beat England in the semi-finals in Russia as well as Spain who are dangerous in anything they put a team into.
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Betting
There is an element of guesswork involved in this tournament with who will take it seriously and who won’t as well as who is in a good group and who isn’t. My gut feeling is it could be worth taking someone who isn’t a certainty to qualify for Euro 2020 by right as this will become a big event should they need a second route.
With that in mind I think Italy might be the ones to back. Having missed out on the World Cup, Italy have a point to prove anyway but they are no longer going to get an easy ride in qualifying but if they are going to make it through they will need to build up some confidence in this competition. Portugal don’t seem to be playing Cristiano Ronaldo in this which will give Italy the edge over them and they should have the beating of Poland to make it through. Anything can happen from there but at 12/1 a punt on the Italians feels right.
Tips
Back Italy to win UEFA Nations League (e/w) for a 1/10 stake at 13.00 with Skybet (1/3 1-2)
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