Portugal will be no higher than pot 3 if they qualify for Euro 2020

Portugal’s defeat at the hands of Ukraine means that Portugal are now all but unable to be in either of pot 1 or pot 2 for the European Championship next summer if they qualify.

Portugal got their Euro 2020 qualifying campaign back on track after back-to-back victories against Serbia and Lithuania last month moved them up to 2nd place, before beating Luxembourg last week.

Now, however, a defeat in Kiev against Ukraine means that Portugal sit 7 points behind their opponents in the group with just two games to go, condemning Portugal to, at best, 2nd place in the group.

With the top two from each group advancing, many might suggest that it doesn’t particularly matter that Portugal are out of touching distance of Andriy Shevchenko’s side at the top of the pile. But that doesn’t tell the full story.

That is because the teams at the final tournament will be seeded based on their performance in the qualifying campaign. It means that, despite Portugal winning the Euros in 2016 and the Nations League over the summer, they have no chance of being in pot 1.

In total, there are 10 qualifying groups, so there will be 10 group winners and 10 runners-up, joined by the four winners of the Nations League path at the finals in 2020. Only the 6 best 1st-place teams in the qualifying group are put in pot 1, meaning that even topping the group wouldn’t have guaranteed Portugal a spot in the top pot. Coming in 2nd, however, means that Portugal will now not even make it into pot 2.

Here is the breakdown of how the pots at the Euros are constructed:

As you can see from the table above, it was of the upmost importance that Portugal cracked top spot in their group, as finishing 2nd always meant that Portugal were very likely to only manage to get into pot 3, with only two of the ten qualifying runners-up getting awarded with a pot 2 spot.

And Portugal are confirmed as, at best, being a pot 3 team at the 2020 Euros should they qualify, with Portugal unable to catch Russia, while the fact that Netherlands, Germany and Northern Ireland all play each other in the coming month means that only the most unlikely of circumstances will prevent the runners-up in their group accumulating more points than Portugal’s absolute maximum of 17.

Is it absolutely impossible for Portugal to be in pot 2 for the draw? In truth, no - though it is incredibly unlikely. Not only will Portugal need to obviously beat both Lithuania and Luxembourg, potentially quite comfortably too, but they will also require ALL of the following to happen to have a chance of being in pot two:

• Netherlands to fail to beat Northern Ireland on November 16th

• Germany to fail to beat Belarus on November 16th

• Netherlands to fail to beat Estonia on November 19th

• Germany to fail to beat Northern Ireland on November 19th

• Either Turkey to fail to beat Iceland (added to a 5 goal swing in Portugal’s favour) or France to fail to beat Albania (added to an 8 goal swing in Portugal’s favour).

As such, barring a miracle of the highest order, Portugal are confirmed to be in pot 3 alongside the likes of Hungary, Czech Republic and Austria, rather than in pot 2 with Spain, France and Poland.

In fact, there is always that very minor possibility that Portugal will miss out on pot 3 altogether as well, with the two worst performing 2nd-place teams in the qualification group stage being given a place in pot 4. That would require Portugal slipping up against at least one of Luxembourg or Lithuania.

Before this year, UEFA used the UEFA national team coefficient, the continental equivalent to the FIFA World rankings, to decipher who would be in each pot. Since Portugal are invariably one of the top 6 nations, more often then not in the top 4 too, before this year, Portugal have frequently been in pot 1 since the turn of the century.

However, now their method of deciphering who goes into which pot has changed, the necessity to qualify with comfort has never been more important.

Some astute observers may say that Portugal are at an unfair advantage, being in a group of only 5 teams while most other sides are in a group with 6 teams. To make up for the deficit, only results against the top 5 sides in each group are counted towards the rankings, so any victories secured over minnows such as Gibraltar, San Marino and Liechtenstein will not count towards the points and goal difference in the ranking system.

This is how the pots would look if the groups were to finish today:

Pot 1: Ukraine, Belgium, Italy, England, Netherlands, Croatia.

Pot 2: Spain, Poland, Turkey, Republic of Ireland, Russia, France.

Pot 3: Germany, Austria, Denmark, Czech Republic, Hungary, PORTUGAL.

Pot 4: Sweden, Finland, Switzerland*, Bosnia and Herzegovina*, Scotland*, Georgia*.

*Four potential winners through the Nations League path.