Green shoots as Ireland on course for play-off seeding

The Republic of Ireland are on course to be seeded in the Euro 2016 play-offs as things stand if they retain third place in Group D. But they would be highly unlikely to finish as the best third-placed team, with Ukraine currently leading the chase for that automatic qualifying spot ahead of Croatia and Hungary.

With two rounds of games to go, we don’t know how things will pan out, but Martin O’Neill and his employers would be hugely relieved to be amongst the seeded teams in the event that they finish third in Group D as all four of the higher ranked sided qualified for Euro 2012.

From an Irish perspective, a trip to Albania or Israel would likely be seen as preferable to having to take on either Ukraine or Sweden.

Drew Iran

Good fortune has been a key factor on the two previous occasions that Ireland made it to a championship by way of the play-offs. In 2001, Mick McCarthy’s side drew Iran rather than a range of possible European opponents that included Belgium, Germany and Romania.

In 2011, the association’s officials at the draw made no secret of their delight when Giovanni Trapattoni’s team was paired with Estonia, clearly the weakest of the potential opponents.

Getting to the finals then earned the FAI around €8 million, despite the poor showing of the team in Poland.With the participation fee having been increased to €12 million for 2016, qualification followed by a stronger performance in France, say quarter-final elimination, would be expected to bring in around €20 million for the cash strapped association.

It’s big money but, it would seem, a pretty tall order for any side aiming to make it to the tournament through the play-offs.

Remarkably, Martin O’Neill’s men could at this point make it to France without having beaten one of the other best three teams in the group. Amongst the other contenders for play-off places are Turkey who have won just a single game, once results against Kazakhstan are excluded, and Estonia, though they fell to fourth after losing to Slovenia last night, who have managed just two goals against group rivals other than San Marino.

Negative goal difference

Three of the nine sides currently lying third have negative goal differences when only results against the other four leading sides in their groups are counted, the basis on which different sides are compared for the purpose of selecting the one automatic qualifier.

The system means that the identity of the side that finishes last in a group can be an important factor, as in Group A where the Turks would benefit significantly if Kazakhstan could overhaul Latvia to finish fifth. If they did, it would mean a gain of four points for Turkey as they drew both home and away with the Latvians, something that would put them vaguely in contention for automatic progression. All of which, of course, could be made redundant by a Dutch revival.

Meanwhile, Denmark will be fortunate not to slip behind Albania in Group I; one of several instances in which the seedings might be affected by a shift in standings as the Danes are well above Ireland in the Uefa rankings and the Albanians well below. The Uefa rankings are very different to the Fifa ones in that they are only based on competitive games in the last three qualifying and finals tournaments, something that significantly boosts Ireland’s status .