From
Euro 2016 onwards the European Championships will expand from 16 to 24 teams,
in the official literature produced by UEFA’s Executive Committee it stated the
reason would be to:
“give middle ranked
countries a much greater chance to qualify for the final tournament, thereby
expanding the fanbase directly reached, and increasing the number of matches
played and increasing overall stadium capacity”
In
short make more money. I don’t want this to come across as a negative attack on
the current trend for taking football to new frontiers, as ridiculous as a
World Cup in Qatar does seem, but more an assessment if something isn’t broke
then don’t go trying to fix it.
Let
us start with some simple figures, UEFA has 53 member associations who can
enter the qualification process for the European Championships, in the present
format 16 teams can earn a place in the finals (host included), a percentage
representation of 30%. That’s right being within the top 30% counts as being
part of the elite of European Football. Expanding the tournament to 24 teams
sees that percentage rise to 45%, nearly half! This means that almost 1 in 2
teams could qualify for a prestigious tournament reserved for the best in
Europe.
But
the UEFA statement reads as ‘ to give middle ranked countries a much greater
chance to qualify for the final tournament’ I hear you say, well if you don’t
mind begging my indulgence here is a list of teams who I’m sure fall under
UEFA’s ‘middle ranked demographic’ and when they made their debuts:
As
can be seen every tournament since its re-invention as the Euros in 1980 has
seen at least 1 country debut, many of the countries listed there have also then
re-appeared at later tournaments and some of them have produced some of the
most memorable tournament performances in the history for football.
Denmark’s
triumph at Euro’92 is the greatest football fairy-tale ever told, while Greece
gritted their way to triumph at Euro 2004, both teams considered nothing but
cannon fodder before a ball had been kicked. At Euro ’96 the Czech Republic
re-debuted as beaten finalists and Turkey reached the Semi-Finals of Euro 2008
showing that these middle ranked teams who have earned their way to the Finals
have done well. Add this to FIFA and UEFA’s recent penchant for giving
tournaments to countries who you would not usually expect and there seems
little risk of each and every tournament not seeming fresher than the last one.
The
fact that Euro 2016 is going to be in France is fresh in its sheer
conventionality. In the qualifying for Euro 2012 countries such as Estonia,
Bosnia and Montenegro were a play-off away from making their debuts. The
current format does give these ‘middle tiered’ countries the opportunity to
qualify for these tournaments they just have to work hard and perform well to
take them.
What
the UEFA idea of expansion to 24 teams does is attempt to gift these sides an
easier path, and perhaps more cynically help prevent the bigger nations from
not qualifying if they have an indifferent campaign. It would take something
special away from the actual achievement of qualifying if the path to the
Finals is met with less resistance and when you get there you find your still
only one of about half the best teams in Europe. If it was meant to be easy to
get their then it wouldn’t be called the European Championship FINALS if would
be called the ‘Next Round’.Putting the qualifying process aside though the expansion to 24 teams also leaves us with a bit of a Mathematical problem. 24 doesn’t easily work its way down to 2 for a final. UEFA’s Resolution: a final tournament consisting of six groups of four teams, followed by a round of 16, quarter-finals, semi-finals and final. The top two from each group would qualify in addition to the four best third-ranked sides, the same system as was applied in the World Cups from 1986 to 1994. A format last used 20 years ago, really? And if that doesn’t make sense what makes things worse is UEFA’s General Secretary Gianni Infantino, a man in part responsible for coming up with the idea in the first place, has said the new format is ‘not ideal’.
I
tell you why he said that, because it’s not just ‘not ideal’ but it is in fact
flawed.
Earlier
I mentioned that 45% of those entered will qualify for the finals, well of the
24 teams entered, 16, yeah that’s right 66% of those who turn up will qualify
for the next round. In theory a team could qualify for the Round of 16 without
winning a game. How does that create positive, attractive and exciting
tournaments? Greece won their way to Euro 2004 with organisation and
opportunism, and here we are 8 years later and this same philosophy is being
proclaimed as the way to win a tournament for a lesser light, while teams like
Spain and Germany try to pass and counter their way to glory. Even England are
settling for being ‘functional’ as that’s the cool thing to do now if you’re
not very good.
Let
us look at the conclusion of Group A as an example.
What
if Euro 2012 had 24 teams would Greece have gone for the win they needed to
qualify against Russia knowing that 3rd place could be enough to get them
through? The drama of the final of round of Group A would not be matched in a
24 team format. Part of the joy of football is its sadistic nature to suffer
defeat when glory seems far easier to achieve. The second half would have seen
Russia pass the ball about their defence knowing that a defeat would be enough
to see them through.
Football
is about winning, not settling for defeat. Ask any fan what they hate about
tournament football when watching a game their side is not involved in, a lot
will say ‘dead rubbers’, games where the conclusion is known before kick off or
have no relevance to the greater picture of the Championship. With the
possibility of 3 teams coming out of your group if results go a certain way a
final round decider could turn into a boring procession. The proclamation of
fuller stadiums and greater variety at UEFA’s inception of the format will be
replaced with apathy towards games that once meant something to everyone to
games that mean nothing for some and just a bridge to the next stage.
When
an idea is rolled out and described as ‘not ideal’ by the people that
formulated it you have to ask, is this change necessary or is it change for the
sake of change, for the sake of one man’s vision of his own legacy? A similar
set of changes have been made in the Champions League, although they have
resulted in a greater variety of teams and great stories like APOEL it has left
a tournament of prestige split into a warm up event of group stages with
multiple chances of redemption before the main attraction of the knockout
rounds. Fans have been turning off to it.
Football’s
governing bodies are often chastised for their resistance to change, goal line
technology a case in point, but when change is brought in and you as the
implementer are not sure of what the changes are, are you not best leaving
things as they are? The European Championships works because it is a
streamline, high stakes month of football where the cream of a continent
compete head to head at the top of their game knowing that one off day could
see them sent home knowing this time they just weren’t good enough.
By Chris Marshall
Twitter: https://twitter.com/mistermersh
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/mistermersh
