Latest updates

Check the Important info page for latest updates! (15 February 2024)

Sunday, September 16, 2018

2022 FIFA World Cup seeding (UEFA): 10000 simulations (15 September 2018)

The first two matchdays in the UEFA Nations League 2018/2019 are played. Below the current probabilities (in %) for each team to end in each pot are presented, generated over 10.000 simulations. Teams are ordered by their average pot position.


The July 2019 ranking will probably be used to determine the seeding for the World Cup 2022 European qualification draw.
The qualification format is not yet known in detail. Current practice is to form groups from which the group-winners qualify and a certain amount of runners-up play each other in play-offs for the remaining berths. 
Now with the introduction of the Nations League this format could well change and f.i. the non-qualified league A (and B) top dogs could be qualified (maybe via play-offs) instead of group runners-up.
As long as the new qualification format is unknown I will stick to the current format with a draw from 5 pots of 9 and 1 pot of 10 teams.

Furthermore, in these simulations the first 4 matchdays of EURO 2020 qualifying (to be played in March and June 2019) are not incorporated because their match schedule is not known yet. 

Earlier simulation results from before the start of the UNL can be found here.


team    pot 1    pot 2    pot 3    pot 4    pot 5    pot 6
France 100,00 0 0 0 0 0
Belgium 100,00 0 0 0 0 0
Croatia 100,00 0 0 0 0 0
England 100,00 0 0 0 0 0
Portugal 99,98 0,02 0 0 0 0
Switzerland 99,96 0,04 0 0 0 0
Spain 99,67 0,33 0 0 0 0
Denmark 98,09 1,91 0 0 0 0
Germany 80,61 19,39 0 0 0 0
----------------------------------------
Netherlands 8,63 91,37 0 0 0 0
Sweden 8,04 91,96 0 0 0 0
Poland 3,62 96,38 0 0 0 0
Italy 0,86 99,14 0 0 0 0
Wales 0,54 99,46 0 0 0 0
Austria 0 91,13 8,87 0 0 0
Slovakia 0 75,89 24,11 0 0 0
Romania 0 69,76 30,24 0 0 0
Ukraine 0 56,61 43,39 0 0 0
----------------------------------------
Northern Ireland 0 43,23 56,77 0 0 0
Republic of Ireland 0 40,08 59,92 0 0 0
Serbia 0 12,09 87,39 0,52 0 0
Bosnia-Herzegovina 0 9,60 90,37 0,03 0 0
Iceland 0 0,41 99,53 0,06 0 0
Turkey 0 1,17 96,67 2,16 0 0
Scotland 0 0,01 88,54 11,45 0 0
Montenegro 0 0,02 70,09 29,89 0 0
Greece 0 0 58,15 41,85 0 0
----------------------------------------
Bulgaria 0 0 47,22 52,78 0 0
Russia 0 0 27,11 72,89 0 0
Czech Republic 0 0 7,56 92,44 0 0
Hungary 0 0 2,41 97,59 0 0
Norway 0 0 1,66 98,34 0 0
Albania 0 0 0 100,00 0 0
Finland 0 0 0 100,00 0 0
Slovenia 0 0 0 100,00 0 0
FYR Macedonia 0 0 0 99,18 0,82 0
----------------------------------------
Belarus 0 0 0 0,82 99,18 0
Israel 0 0 0 0 100,00 0
Estonia 0 0 0 0 100,00 0
Cyprus 0 0 0 0 100,00 0
Georgia 0 0 0 0 100,00 0
Luxembourg 0 0 0 0 100,00 0
Faroe Islands 0 0 0 0 100,00 0
Armenia 0 0 0 0 100,00 0
Azerbaijan 0 0 0 0 99,37 0,63
----------------------------------------
Kazakhstan 0 0 0 0 0,63 99,37
Lithuania 0 0 0 0 0 100,00
Latvia 0 0 0 0 0 100,00
Andorra 0 0 0 0 0 100,00
Moldova 0 0 0 0 0 100,00
San Marino 0 0 0 0 0 100,00
Kosovo 0 0 0 0 0 100,00
Malta 0 0 0 0 0 100,00
Liechtenstein 0 0 0 0 0 100,00
Gibraltar 0 0 0 0 0 100,00


The inertia of the new ranking calculation method can be seen clearly here. The Germany-Sweden fight for pot 1 looks like a done deal already after Sweden's unexpected bad result against Turkey.
Much of the tension is concentrated in the fight for pots 2 and 3. Pots 5 and 6 and a large part of pot 4 seem already established.

About me:

Software engineer, happily unmarried and non-religious. You won't find me on Twitter or other so called social media. Dutchman, joined the blog in March 2018.

9 comments:

  1. Is there any evidence that FIFA/UEFA are thinking about making 9 European groups again? It makes more sense to have 10 groups because they all need the same number of dates (10). Do the simulations for Netherlands, Sweden, Poland, Italy, and Wales change a lot with 10 spots in the seeded group? Also, what is the hurry for FIFA? Why do they need to do the preliminary draw 3 years and 4 months before the World Cup starts? To me this is truly baffling.

    ReplyDelete
  2. No, no evidence whatsoever. The format is not published yet.

    With groups of 10 (teams ordered by average pot):

    France - 100,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Switzerland - 100,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Belgium - 100,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Portugal - 100,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Croatia - 100,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    England - 100,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Spain - 99,95% - 0,05% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Denmark - 99,84% - 0,16% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Germany - 94,20% - 5,80% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Sweden - 52,35% - 47,65% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    ----------------------
    Netherlands - 23,71% - 76,29% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Poland - 14,87% - 85,13% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Wales - 9,56% - 90,44% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Italy - 5,52% - 94,48% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Austria - 0,00% - 98,33% - 1,67% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Slovakia - 0,00% - 93,80% - 6,20% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Romania - 0,00% - 89,44% - 10,56% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Ukraine - 0,00% - 86,29% - 13,71% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Northern Ireland - 0,00% - 75,14% - 24,86% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Republic of Ireland - 0,00% - 72,93% - 27,07% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    ----------------------
    Serbia - 0,00% - 35,73% - 64,27% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Bosnia-Herzegovina - 0,00% - 35,10% - 64,90% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Turkey - 0,00% - 7,52% - 92,48% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Iceland - 0,00% - 3,83% - 96,17% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Scotland - 0,00% - 1,17% - 98,55% - 0,28% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Montenegro - 0,00% - 0,72% - 98,03% - 1,25% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Greece - 0,00% - 0,00% - 95,18% - 4,82% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Bulgaria - 0,00% - 0,00% - 93,96% - 6,04% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Russia - 0,00% - 0,00% - 88,35% - 11,65% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Czech Republic - 0,00% - 0,00% - 61,56% - 38,44% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    ----------------------
    Hungary - 0,00% - 0,00% - 32,23% - 67,77% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Norway - 0,00% - 0,00% - 29,19% - 70,81% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Finland - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,46% - 99,54% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Slovenia - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,35% - 99,65% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Albania - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,25% - 99,75% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    FYR Macedonia - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00% - 0,00% - 0,00%
    Belarus - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 99,99% - 0,01% - 0,00%
    Luxembourg - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 98,84% - 1,16% - 0,00%
    Cyprus - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 95,19% - 4,81% - 0,00%
    Georgia - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 64,35% - 35,65% - 0,00%
    ----------------------
    Israel - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 19,00% - 81,00% - 0,00%
    Faroe Islands - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 14,81% - 85,19% - 0,00%
    Estonia - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 7,78% - 92,22% - 0,00%
    Armenia - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,04% - 99,96% - 0,00%
    Lithuania - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00% - 0,00%
    Latvia - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00% - 0,00%
    Kazakhstan - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00% - 0,00%
    Andorra - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00% - 0,00%
    Azerbaijan - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00% - 0,00%
    Kosovo - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00% - 0,00%
    ----------------------
    Moldova - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00%
    San Marino - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00%
    Malta - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00%
    Liechtenstein - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00%
    Gibraltar - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 0,00% - 100,00%

    Most confederations really need that amount of time to finish their qualification properly and I guess FIFA likes to have a fancy event ("The Preliminary Draw") for all confederations together, mostly as a preliminary showcase for the host.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Thank you very much. Let's hope the Euro 2020 qualifying games in March and June change something on top or another nightmarish World Cup qualifying group with Spain and Italy could be in the making .....

    ReplyDelete
  4. I read an article suggesting that the Nations League would also be used for World Cup Qualifying, but only Leagues A and B. Can't remember where, sorry, possibly the Guardian. It didn't elaborate further, but IF it's true, I expect that the seeding for the World Cup Qualifiers would be based on Nations League performance, as the Euro Qualifiers are. Given that Europe is scheduled to have thirteen places for Qatar, I'd also guess they would go with eleven groups of five in the main qualifying section with only the group winners qualifying.

    This may change further if CONMEBOL gets their wish and the increase to 48 teams comes in for 2022 rather than 2026. If that is the case Europe would have sixteen spots.

    ReplyDelete
  5. CD, this is about FIFA World Cup qualifying. FIFA was for their last two WC qualifying cycles vague (and that's an understatement) about many issues but one thing they made absolutely clear in their regulations: the FIFA ranking will be used for seeding of qualifying and final stages. And so it happened. With even the publishing of an extra, unscheduled FIFA-ranking in June 2016 to seed the third round of African qualifying in the way someone evidently wanted as most extreme (and shameful) example.
    I don't see that opinion change all of a sudden with the introduction of the Nations League competitions.

    The qualification format however is quite another aspect. Each confederation proposes a format they think suits their purposes best and FIFA (almost always) accepts. Your idea of 11 groups of 5 with only group winners qualifying, plus 2 teams coming from the UNL sounds plausible. But so are some other qualifying formats which incorporate UNL-qualifiers. We will just have to wait and see.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. There should be more than 13 spots for europe considering it's the toughest section to get out of. 20 spots would be fairer. With africa and Asia and Oceania pared down to 6 spots, and south america pared up to 6 spots.

      Delete
  6. There won't be 48 teams in Qatar. COMNEBOL's proposal was on the agenda of the last FIFA Congress (which also awarded the 2026 hosting rights), but they said the proposal had been withdrawn, so it wasn't even discussed.

    ReplyDelete
  7. When will Asian Worldcup qualifications start

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. According to AFC's Competition Calendar the first round of qualifying (two-legged play-offs) will be played in June 2019, so before the official preliminary draw in July 2019.
      The second round (10 MDs for 8 groups of 5 teams) will be played from September 2019 until June 2020.
      The third round (10 MDs for 2 groups of 6 teams) will be played from September 2020 until October 2021 and the fourth round (a two-legged play-off between the two group numbers 3) will be played in November 2021.

      Delete