Austria

After the nail biting performance of the national teams during the international tournament earlier this year, the run up to release of the Euro 2020 schedules were greatly anticipated by fans worldwide. Therefore as earlier this week the fixtures and groupings for the UEFA European Championships Qualifiers 2020 were announced, we thought we would put this article together for our readers. This blog therefore covers how the groups have been drawn and who are expected to be the ones to beat.

What the Euro 2020 Qualifying Groups Look Like

In advance of the UEFA Euro 2020 tournament, the qualifiers are to take place in order to determine which 24 teams advance to the Championship. The qualifying tournament runs in addition to the brand new 2018/19 UEFA Nations Cup, which offers an alternative route to qualification for the 2020 tournament. Here is the breakdown of each country that is eligible for a place in the upcoming games and who they are playing against in their groups:

At the moment the national teams are currently battling it out on the football pitch to win the new Nations League trophy. And with the extra bonus of four places in the Euro tournament in two years’ time up for grabs, the anticipation to succeed in Nations League is high.

As this is a very new tournament we wanted to put this post together to cover all of the need to know information about the ongoing games. From how the season is scheduled to who are the strongest teams so far, read below to find out all the latest info.

What is the Nation’s League?

The Nations League was first set-up in 2018 as an alternative way for national teams to acquire a place in the Euros, and replaced the current friendly matches for competition matches. This series of matches will take place every two years on the run-up to the next European league tournament.

How the Nations League works is that all 55 national teams will be split into 4 leagues depending on their skill levels

Austria were never expected to be one of the most dominant nations involved in the qualifying competition for the 2016 European Championship. On the contrary, the Austria national football team were ranked 27^th out of the 53 competitors in the qualifiers, back when the UEFA was seeding teams for the group stage draw. They were placed in pot three for the draw, which means that they were expected to finish third in their eventual group draw, Group G. Russia and Sweden were the group's pot one and pot two draws. But needless to say, in the Euro 2016 qualifiers Austria surprised everyone with their dominant performances.

Upsets and Surprises

Needless to say, Group G has proven to be a bundle of surprises over the past 13 months. First of all, Austria stunned all football pundits by not only winning the group but by going undefeated to do so. Indeed, with nine wins and one draw, Austria had the second best record

Group D is unique among UEFA's 2018 World Cup qualifying groups in that there really isn't a heavyweight team among the six countries competing there. Group A has the Netherlands and France; B has Portugal; C has Germany; F has England; G has Spain; and H has Belgium. But World Cup 2018 UEFA Qualifying Group D -which consists of Wales, Austria, Serbia, Republic of Ireland, Moldova, and Georgia-will almost certainly give the 2018 World Cup in Russia one of its bigger underdogs.

Group D Teams and World Cup History

That's because none of these national football teams have much of a pedigree on the global scale. Wales for instance, have been to the World Cup just once-back in 1958-though they did manage to reach the quarterfinals that year.

Austria probably have the most consistent history at the World Cup of any of the countries in Group D. The Austrian national soccer team had a lot of success at the tournament in