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2018 FIFA World Cup - Russia

178K views 3K replies 92 participants last post by  alchemist 
#1 ·
With the current drama/situation surrounding the Serbian NT after the CAS verdict (and poor Euro Qualifying form even prior to the verdict), it seems only right that a Hrvat such as myself take Sally's advice (and Krle's +1) and be the one to open up the 2018 FIFA World Cup thread here on the Serb forum. :D








The European section of the 2018 FIFA World Cup qualification will act as qualifiers for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, to be held in Russia, for national teams which are members of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA). Apart from Russia, which qualify automatically as hosts, a total of 13 slots in the final tournament are available for UEFA teams.

The qualifying format was confirmed by the UEFA Executive Committee meeting on 22–23 March 2015 in Vienna.

Format
The qualification structure is as follows:

First round (group stage): The 52 teams will be divided into nine groups (seven groups of six teams and two groups of five teams) to play home-and-away round-robin matches. The winners of each group will qualify for the 2018 FIFA World Cup, and the eight best runners-up will advance to the second round (play-offs).

Second round (play-offs): The eight best runners-up from the first round will play home-and-away over two legs. The four winners will qualify for the 2018 FIFA World Cup.

Seeding
The draw for the first round (group stage) will be held on 25 July 2015, at the Konstantinovsky Palace in Strelna, Saint Petersburg, Russia.

The seeding will be based on the FIFA World Rankings of July 2015. The 52 teams are seeded into six pots:

Pot 1 contains the teams ranked 1–9.
Pot 2 contains the teams ranked 10–18.
Pot 3 contains the teams ranked 19–27.
Pot 4 contains the teams ranked 28–36.
Pot 5 contains the teams ranked 37–45.
Pot 6 contains the teams ranked 46–52.

Each six-team group contains one team from each of the six pots, while each five-team group contains one team from each of the first five pots.

Due to the centralisation of media rights for European Qualifiers, England, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the Netherlands will all be drawn into six-team groups. They may be placed in the same group if they are in different seeding pots.

Due to the political situation between the countries, and based on the relevant decisions taken by the UEFA Executive Committee, Azerbaijan and Armenia cannot be drawn together.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2018_FIFA_World_Cup_qualification_(UEFA)


Here are the seeded teams that will start each qualification group:



And here are the teams that will be drawn, 1 from each pot, into the qualification groups:












World Cup 2018 Qualifiers begin next September after the 2016 Euros in France wrap up in July!
 
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#2 ·
:howler: @ Nepoznat.

And some of you were saying our Euro 2014 group was easy, yet Wales, Belgium, and Croatia are all in Pot 1. :D

Anyways...

Easiest Group: (on paper)
Romania/Wales
Iceland
Serbia
Faroe Islands
Moldova
Andorra

The group we'll probably get:
Germany
Italy
Serbia
Turkey
Finland
Kazakhstan

:rollani:
 
#4 · (Edited)
:howler: @ Nepoznat.
:)


Close and delete. A troll will not start our World Cup thread.

come on milos, have a little fun with me, I'm not being a troll by starting the thread, just having a little fun but I can & will contribute positively to the thread. For example I made the thread / OP nice with graphics and links and information, no?
 
#10 ·
:howler:

Not exactly what I meant, but hopefully their qualifying magic rubs off on us.

These guys may not know senior tournament success since 1998, but they're qualifying wizards! :party:

*Wales and Romania in pot 1 despite not qualifying for anything recently.
*Croatia being a pot 1 team despite not winning a group since 2008 :confused:

The weighting of the current qualification campaign is definitely too high.
:thumbsup:

Ridiculously high.

Wales were actually Serbia's whipping boys in the last campaign. Can't believe the rise they've made all of a sudden.
 
#11 ·
I agree that's nuts for Wales & Romania being in Pot 1. Croatia may not have won a group since 2008 however we have only missed one tournament in the past 10 years, and that campaign started a few months after Eduardo's leg was broken (we would've been a force at Euro 2008 had he been in the squad at full health, hell we beat up on Germany in the group stage and were 1 minute away from the Semi Finals before we let in equalizer even without Eduardo). So Croatia's relative consistency helped our rankings and we are often in Pot 1


I think the UEFA coefficient points system is better, and the elo rankings too. And FIFA's system is going to treat the upcoming & inugural 2018-19 UEFA Nations League matches as Friendlies rather than Tournament games (Friendlies are worth less points)!
 
#9 ·
This could be a good omen. Imagine Serbia wins the world cup :howler::howler: and this donkeys and attempt at trolling completely backfires..

Or even, Croatia can't muster up enough bosnians,albanians,serbs or Brazilians to play for them and they don't qualify
 
#15 ·
depends on how you define best strikers no? if you mean top 3 player then definitely no, but if we're talking top 25 he's definitely in consideration for those years, no?

I mean he had 10 goals in 12 international matches in that Qualifying period, nearly 1 goal for every match at representation/association level!

And he had like 60 goals for his clubs during < 80 matches during the same 2 or so year period, which is > 3:4 ratio of goals per game


seems pretty damn good to me
 
#16 ·
How the **** are Romania and Wales ranked so high?

If you took our games against them people would think we were some kind of world beaters.

Anyway not positive about this campaign even now. Not until Tole is gone.
 
#17 ·
well I hope the next qualifiers for Russia 2018 are good for Serbia ,and not a extra sport issue go again against Serbia cause im getting tire of this bulling from thee international football organization that respond to politics whenever they want tio satisfy specially to the EU powers to punish Serbia for no reason, like they did banning Yugoslavia(Serbia) euro92 and USA94, at that times they ruin that generation of players that could have win those tournaments and now reversing a Uefa decision In favor of Serbia against Albania ,but now came CAS and reverse the decision and not only giving the victory to Albania and the points ,but at the same time Eliminating Serbia from France 2016 is the biggest unjustice that they ever make
 
#20 ·
Striker, it didn't look very likely that we would have qualified for these Euros anyways, basically after the Albania game. Dropping points to them at home is costly, especially when it would have most likely come down to the two of us fitting it out for a chance in the playoffs. Albania also got a result against Portugal, so, they were already in a much better position than us, especially considering how we dropped points away to Armenia in the 1st game.
 
#25 ·
I only hope that next campaign Serbia qualifies for Russia 2018, some times I wish that dragan stockjovic, nimisa mihailovic, nikola zigic, and mateja kezman were younger to take this Serbian team to its past and future glories I think they will qualify Serbia at the start of next qualifiers of caourse if they were younger to play for Serbia sorry I for got dejan Stankovic :p .
 
#38 ·
GROUP A
Netherlands
France
Sweden
Bulgaria
Belarus
Luxembourg

GROUP B
Portugal
Switzerland
Hungary
Faroe Islands
Latvia
Andorra

GROUP C
Germany
Czech Republic
Northern Ireland
Norway
Azerbaijan
San Marino

GROUP D
Wales
Austria
Serbia
Republic of Ireland
Georgia
Moldova


GROUP E
Romania
Denmark
Poland
Montenegro
Armenia
Kazakhstan

GROUP F
England
Slovakia
Scotland
Slovenia
Lithuania
Malta

GROUP G
Spain
Italy
Albania
Israel
Macedonia
Liechtensten

GROUP H
Belgium
BiH
Greece
Estonia
Cyprus

GROUP I
Croatia
Iceland
Ukraine
Turkey
Finland
 
#39 ·
It's a very good group for Serbia. Austria are clear favourites in my eyes at this moment in time but these things can change over time. Serbia were favourites back when the draw was made and we had qualified for the World Cup more or less back when we drew Croatia and Belgium so it tells you a little bit of how these things work. Wales is good at the moment but and Ireland will be a tough team to beat for us in our current form. Long journey to Georgia who're good enough to cause upsets while Moldova is generally terrible side, just like us these qualifiers.
 
#40 ·
Come on Piksi, majstore, no better time than now! :pray:

We've finished above Wales and Austria in recent qualifying groups, beating both twice during the campaign. We also have a history with Ireland and a decent record. The other two sides are new to us, but on paper we should be favourites in both. Not that that's ever meant much. :D
 
#42 ·
:howler:

We're probably ranked fourth at the moment while others, like, let's say LjubaM would say we're ranked 6th in our group :D
 
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