Every team has to be given a chance, no matter how small they are. Imo they could try a system similar to what Fiba used a while back for qualifying in basketball EC. Here's some copy/pasta from wikipedia:

24 European teams take part in the final competition. The qualification format that existed until FIBA EuroBasket 2011 permitted 16 teams to compete. Eight spots were determined by the host nation and the top seven finishers of the previous EuroBasket. The remaining Division A teams compete in a qualification tournament. There, they were divided into four groups. Each group played a double round-robin. The top team in each group qualified for EuroBasket. The best three of the four runners-up also qualified.
Of the ten teams that did not qualify in the qualification tournament, the six best got another chance in the additional qualification round. The remaining four competed in a relegation round, with two being sent to Division B for the next qualification cycle (and replaced by the two best teams from Division B).
The final spot was determined by the additional qualifying round. The six teams were divided into two groups of three, with each group playing a double round-robin. The top team in each group played in the final against the other group's top team; the winner of that game received the final EuroBasket qualification spot.

Basically, make all the shitty teams play in lower division with top performers qualifying for the main division during the next cycle thus having a shot at the getting to the main tournament and vice versa. The worst 2, 3 or 4 teams from the elite division get relegated and automatically miss out on the next tournament. That way there would be much less pointless games in qualifiers and the main tournament alike. And i'm pretty sure teams would put much more effort and preparation into every game.

This post was edited by vygax on Oct 10 2014 04:34pm

Got to look at it from the other perspective.

How do you think the San Marino folk feel when they score a goal?

They should be allowed to play in the tournament, if you start the whole "You're not good enough to play here" debate, where exactly does it end?

but the real small teams will still not make it and the mediocre teams already had a chance with the old qualifying modus.

just some of the "surprises" of former tournaments (like england or netherlands not qualifying) are even more unlikely now. every big nation is basically already qualified and it's only a real competition for the mediocre and bad teams. the only thing the real small football nations will be able to say is "this time we were just 2 spots away from qualifying"...

sorry but this thread is useless. makes no point.

i disagree but even if you were right - why do you post in it then? that's even more pointless...

well what would surmise UEFA due about it?
remove the smaller teams from europe from having a chance to qualify or even face bigger nations in football.

name me the countries you dislike so much they arent worthy to compete in euro qualifiers, usually countries with less than a million population.

english plz?




sry, you really managed to completely miss the point and instead assume something completely different. which is kinda funny since you claimed there was no point to begin with.
i'm not suggesting the smaller nations shouldn't participate in qualifiers any more, that would indeed be unfair. but as i mentioned in a previous post, now it's even more unlikely to have a real surprise in the qualifiers because it's almost impossible for a big nation to get in a group with enough decent nations to be eliminated.
and the real small teams still won't make it to the tournament obviously...

Sadly, expanding the Euro from 16 to 24 teams has killed the qualifiers. The expansion was pointless to begin with, but ofc Platini had to make sure he kept the smaller nations happy by giving them a better chance to qualify so they'd vote for him.

Personally, I think that it would be better if the groups were smaller now. Having less games means less room for error and that would allow for there to be a chance for excitement... or at least get it over with asap.

Since 24 out of 54 teams have to make it to the torunament, the format I'd use would be:

host and champions directly qualify, leaving 52 teams fighting for the remaining 22 spots -> the 52 teams would be divided in 13 groups of 4; the champions and 5 best runnerups qualify while the 8 worst runnerups play a playoff for the remaining 4 spots

okay what teams?

if switzerland dont qualify that would be a huge shock to me.

absolutely. smaller groups, less games, better chance for smaller teams. (seeding is still a problem but ok, can't eliminate that imo...)