Scotland v Israel

[John Lambies Doos]

We're a bit lucky for the standard quali draw imo.
As a host we can only be drawn with one other host country, so we have a decent chance of avoiding a possible 2nd seed Germany or Denmark if either of them get England, Spain, Italy etc. as a #1 seed.

This whole set up really makes it piss easy for Scotland to qualify, but heh; we'll manage to f**k it up.

[DA Baracus]

Due to the disgusting high number of utter mutants that live in Scotland (Celtic and Sevco fans) the SFA have felt it necessary to warn folk that they can only bring flags of the two nations playing;

 

[KnightswoodBear]

Excellent, I'll get in with my Israel flag then?

[gannonball]

7 minutes ago, KnightswoodBear said:

Excellent, I'll get in with my Israel flag then?

^ ^^

Occupying somebody's seat in the west bank of the stadium.

[KnightswoodBear]

35 minutes ago, gannonball said:

^ ^^

Occupying somebody's seat in the west bank of the stadium.

They may have purchased a ticket for that seat, but I don't recognise their right to sit in it.

If you disagree with me, you're a bigot.

 

[eez-eh]

36 minutes ago, gannonball said:

^ ^^

Occupying somebody's seat in the west bank of the stadium.

If the Israel fans are sat where away fans normally are, they’ll be the ones occupying the West Bank of the stadium.

[LondonHMFC]

Listening to Talksport, and "Moose" is covering the Scotland game tonight. If anyone see's him, give him a kick in the bollocks. 

As for the game, we will go one behind before coming out 3-1 victors. 

[Frank Grimes]

Enjoying the SFA’s new, thinly veiled “nae ****” rule 

Progress 

[Marshmallo]

Am I right in saying that we can finish second in the group and still potentially get a playoff spot, albeit it'd likely be against a much higher ranked set of teams? 

[Coooombe]

11 minutes ago, Marshmallo said:

Am I right in saying that we can finish second in the group and still potentially get a playoff spot, albeit it'd likely be against a much higher ranked set of teams? 

Yes and no. We could potentially finish second in the group and get an easier set of teams.

The way I understand it is the playoffs fill from the bottom up, so if all of the 1 and 2 seeds qualify then the "league A" playoffs will be contested by the 4 runners up in league C. 

In that example:

Teams D1 - D4 will compete for the D playoff

C1 - C4 in the C playoff

B9 - B 12 in the B playoff (B1-B8 qualified automatically)

C5 - C8 in the A playoff. (A1-A12 qualified automatically).

 

Disclaimer - I've not found any actual sources yet that confirm exactly how this works, but that's how I understand it based on a bit of a throwaway wikipedia comment. 

ETA: It's actually extremely likely that all runners up in C will get a playoff place. The only way this wouldn't be the case is if one or more teams who finish 3rd or below in C, or in D, qualify. 

[Guest bernardblack]

Hate this “typical Scotland nonsense”

Go out tonight, easy home win. Done

[Marshmallo]

12 minutes ago, Coooombe said:

Yes and no. We could potentially finish second in the group and get an easier set of teams.

The way I understand it is the playoffs fill from the bottom up, so if all of the 1 and 2 seeds qualify then the "league A" playoffs will be contested by the 4 runners up in league C. 

In that example:

Teams D1 - D4 will compete for the D playoff

C1 - C4 in the C playoff

B9 - B 12 in the B playoff (B1-B8 qualified automatically)

C5 - C8 in the A playoff. (A1-A12 qualified automatically).

 

Disclaimer - I've not found any actual sources yet that confirm exactly how this works, but that's how I understand it based on a bit of a throwaway wikipedia comment. 

ETA: It's actually extremely likely that all runners up in C will get a playoff place. The only way this wouldn't be the case is if one or more teams who finish 3rd or below in C, or in D, qualify. 

There was a really good worked example on here but I can't find it. If we finish second then we essentially want as many teams from the top two divisions to qualify automatically, is how I understand it. 

[Savage Henry]

Hate this “typical Scotland nonsense”

Go out tonight, easy home win. Done

Scotland do not play better against good teams, either.

The typical Scotland myth is a crutch to deal with the pain of being shite.

[Melanius Mullarkey]

15 minutes ago, bernardblack said:

typical Scotland nonsense

Go out tonight. Done

FTFY

[Savage Henry]

Listening to Talksport

Well there’s your first mistake.

[Coooombe]

1 minute ago, Marshmallo said:

There was a really good worked example on here but I can't find it. If we finish second then we essentially want as many teams from the top two divisions to qualify automatically, is how I understand it. 

Essentially, yes. What would royally screw that up is if one or two of the big nations messed up in qualifying, as then we'd be pushed into the league A playoffs to potentially face Italy/Holland/etc. 

Just by working through it, there are 20 automatic places and 16 playoff places. If the top 20 teams qualify, and the 4 D diddies take up 4 playoff spots, then the next 12 teams in ranking order would take up the playoffs, which would include all of the C runners up. The more teams below the C runners up who qualify automatically, the fewer C runners up which get a playoff spot. 

[DAFC.]

Israel will be sitting back tonight and playing for a draw. Time to go out and absolutely destroy them to make up for the embarrassment of the away defeat . No excuses tonight, we should be winning this handsomely. 

[craigkillie]

45 minutes ago, Marshmallo said:

Am I right in saying that we can finish second in the group and still potentially get a playoff spot, albeit it'd likely be against a much higher ranked set of teams? 

I'd go as far as to say that if we finish 2nd in the group, we are extremely likely to still get a play-off spot as a result of being "moved up".

If we finish 2nd in our group then we'll be somewhere from 29th-31st in the overall Nations League rankings (to finish 32nd, we'd need to lose by 5 goals tonight, so we can hopefully eliminate that possibility).

There would be a total of 12 play-off spots available for teams ranked above us (4 in A, 4 in B, 4 in C).

Let's assume the worst case scenario where we end up ranked 31st (ie the third best runner up - this could only happen if we lose tonight and a result goes against us in Group 4). For us not to get a play-off place, there would have to be 12 non-qualified teams ranked above us. That would mean that only 18 of the automatic qualification places were earned by teams in League A or League B, or by the winners of League C. In other words, at least two teams ranked below us in the Nations League would have to qualify automatically.

If we end up ranked 30th, that would be three teams, and if we end up ranked 29th (most likely outcome if we draw tonight), it would have to be four teams below us (and also none of the four League C winners qualifying automatically).

[forameus]

1 minute ago, craigkillie said:

I'd go as far as to say that if we finish 2nd in the group, we are extremely likely to still get a play-off spot as a result of being "moved up".

If we finish 2nd in our group then we'll be somewhere from 29th-31st in the overall Nations League rankings (to finish 32nd, we'd need to lose by 5 goals tonight, so we can hopefully eliminate that possibility).

There would be a total of 12 play-off spots available for teams ranked above us (4 in A, 4 in B, 4 in C).

Let's assume the worst case scenario where we end up ranked 31st (ie the third best runner up - this could only happen if we lose tonight and a result goes against us in Group 4). For us not to get a play-off place, there would have to be 12 non-qualified teams ranked above us. That would mean that only 18 of the automatic qualification places were earned by teams in League A or League B, or by the winners of League C. In other words, at least two teams ranked below us in the Nations League would have to qualify automatically.

If we end up ranked 30th, that would be three teams, and if we end up ranked 29th (most likely outcome if we draw tonight), it would have to be four teams below us (and also none of the four League C winners qualifying automatically).

I look forward to the prospect of this kind of analysis on Sportsound or SSB.

[wellinwigan]

6 minutes ago, craigkillie said:

I'd go as far as to say that if we finish 2nd in the group, we are extremely likely to still get a play-off spot as a result of being "moved up".

If we finish 2nd in our group then we'll be somewhere from 29th-31st in the overall Nations League rankings (to finish 32nd, we'd need to lose by 5 goals tonight, so we can hopefully eliminate that possibility).

There would be a total of 12 play-off spots available for teams ranked above us (4 in A, 4 in B, 4 in C).

Let's assume the worst case scenario where we end up ranked 31st (ie the third best runner up - this could only happen if we lose tonight and a result goes against us in Group 4). For us not to get a play-off place, there would have to be 12 non-qualified teams ranked above us. That would mean that only 18 of the automatic qualification places were earned by teams in League A or League B, or by the winners of League C. In other words, at least two teams ranked below us in the Nations League would have to qualify automatically.

If we end up ranked 30th, that would be three teams, and if we end up ranked 29th (most likely outcome if we draw tonight), it would have to be four teams below us (and also none of the four League C winners qualifying automatically).

This is giving me a headache trying to work this all out. I will just wait till 2020 to see if we have made it or not