There’s a general distrust from English fans generally when it comes to international football. Easily qualifying for almost every international tournament and in the past decade being there or thereabouts at the business end of tournament, making it to semi-final and final matches at the Euros and World Cup. This has led to the Nations League being looked at with disdain by some fans, a pointless concept that does nothing but milk more money from fans and overloads the players. This isn’t the view from many nations and fans though, instead seeing it as better than friendlies and the chance to play against a similar standard of nation on a regular basis. It’s like a half-competitive match instead of a non-competitive friendly.
What is the impact of the Nations League on UEFA countries?
The change in the international calendar was agreed between UEFA and the European Club Association (ECA) back in 2012, reducing friendly matches from 12 to 9 a year and the August round of friendlies removed completely (this was always the worst international break, a midweek game often just a week or two after the start of the domestic club season in Europe).
The Nations League is spread between leagues A through D, groups of four or three in each league, playing home and away. This pits countries against others of a similar standard, based on FIFA rankings and seeding coefficients. There is promotion and relegation between the leagues, adding tension, and a finals tournament for League A with a home and away quarter final, before one-legged semi-final, third/fourth place play-off, and the final.
The thing is, as much as some football fans will claim the Nations League is pointless, and that the new International Break that covers 3 weeks at the end of September/beginning of October is too long, many countries have really taken to it. Portugal have won it twice, and count it as a genuine international tournament, and why wouldn’t they. You have to get through a group stage, and a knockout from a quarter final stage on.
The Nations League was brought in to replace friendlies. Pointless friendlies multiple times a year, sometimes in addition to qualifiers or sometimes just to fill the match date in an international window. They were often boring, teams playing youth players, elite players dropping like flies with ‘injuries’ before returning to play for their clubs fully fit a few days later. In friendlies you could make as many subs as you liked too, an extreme example of this was a 2003 England friendly versus Australia at the Boleyn Ground (West Ham’s stadium before the contentious move to the London Stadium). England manager Sven-Göran Eriksson played a different 11 in each half, a young Wayne Rooney making his debut alongside the ‘fox in the box’ Francis Jeffers.
The lower-ranked countries have benefited the most from the Nations League and the removal of friendlies. In the regular qualifying groups for the Euros and World Cup the qualifiers are seeded, you’ll get six groups of four teams and six groups of five teams, each place in a qualifying group taken up by a country from a specific pot. Teams will never play another of the same coefficient standard.
The Nations League changes all that. In League A, you’ll get the titans playing against each other like Netherlands v Germany, Spain v England etc, but at each level there are more competitive matches taking place than can usually be found in qualifying. This approach has given countries who might not get anywhere near a victory in years a chance to get those wins against similarly-ranked nations. Think about San Marino, beating Liechtenstein home and away in the 2024-25 Nations League campaign or Luxembourg, using the Nations League to build confidence before taking that form into World Cup qualifying for 2022, with three victories in 8 matches, the previous 3 victories came across 11 qualifying campaigns stretching back to the 1970s! The Nations League gives a chance to every nation to play for something meaningful, to aspire to become better, and not just be the fodder of the lowest-ranked team in a group or the middle of the road never looking up or down.
It's also changed qualifying, and this is where some commentators have found fault. A second chance is given to teams that haven’t managed to qualify through conventional means, with extra play-off places awarded to countries based on Nations League performance. This has led to Italy being given a second chance (that they have failed to take advantage of twice and still missed out on the World Cup) but on a positive spin it has led to lower-ranked nations qualifying for the first time, such as North Macedonia at the 2020 Euros or Georgia in 2024. These are inspiring stories that truly do involve the entire footballing world, not just the elite.
What do you think about the Nations League? Is it worthy of its current status in the international calendar or should we return to friendlies?
Did you enjoy this post?