Task 2

Team A
Miky (TM)
Nadz
Olly
Trebs

Team B
Hero (TM)
Bam
Marky
Fluxy

Task

With UEFA imposing a new nations league amongst other stuff they have decided that the European championships need an overhaul. You have been in charge of overseeing the changes to the competition. Good Luck with the task

Lord Odnan

Can you confirm when the deadline to submit our proposal is please?

Wednesday at noon.

I shall be watching Transfer Deadline Day so got free time being an Arsenal fan

Our team's submission will be handed in around 1pm, apologies.

Noon is the deadline Trebs.

Not like we've had a whole week...

With UEFA imposing a new nations league amongst other stuff they have decided that the European championships need an overhaul. You have been in charge of overseeing the changes to the competition.

Over the qualification season there's 10 matches, and at least 6 friendlies, so we didn't see why we couldn't divide the countries into Leagues of 16/16/16/7.

The leagues would be initially set up using the Fifa rankings for the European sides. None of us like Fifa rankings but they're arguably the best starting point we have.

League A - 1-16 on Fifa rankings
League B - 17-32 on Fifa rankings
League C - 33-48 on Fifa rankings
League D - 49-55 + new countries that seem to get formed all the time

Have a Football League structure, instead of 10 qualifiers and 6 friendlies, just have 15 competitive games over the 2 year qualification period (8 at home, 7 away, decided by luck of the draw)

The top 13 of League A, the top 8 of League B, the top 2 of League C, and the winner of a playoff between 3rd in League C and the winner of League D would complete the 24 competing sides at the European Championships.

The bottom 3 in League A drop to League B for the next campaign
The top 3 in League B go up to League A for the next campaign

The bottom 3 in League B drop to League C
The top 3 in League C go up to League B

The bottom 3 in League C go down to League D
The top 3 in League D go up to League C

We decided this format would continue every two years to cover World Cup qualification, but instead of 24 European Championship places being up for grabs, it would be the 13 European World Cup places.

The Top 9 of League A
The Top 3 of League B

The 4th placed side in League B would play the winners of a playoff between the winners of Leagues C and D, so that every nation has a chance of qualification.

Based on current rankings, the initial setup would be;

League A
Germany
Portugal
Belgium
Spain
Poland
Switzerland
France
Denmark
Italy
Croatia
England
Sweden
Wales
Iceland
Netherlands
Northern Ireland

League B
Slovakia
Austria
Republic of Ireland
Scotland
Ukraine
Serbia
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Romania
Turkey
Bulgaria
Montenegro
Greece
Czech Republic
Hungary
Norway
Albania

League C
Russia
Slovenia
Finland
Macedonia
Luxembourg
Estonia
Armenia
Cyprus
Belarus
Faroe Islands
Israel
Georgia
Azerbaijan
Latvia
Kazakhstan
Andorra

League D
Lithuania
Moldova
Kosovo
Liechtenstein
Malta
San Marino
Gibraltar
[any new nations]

Using the issues in Catalonia as an example, if they formed their own nation in footballing terms, they would begin in League D, playing the other sides in League D home and away, and if they were good enough to finish first, they would playoff against the third best team in League C to qualify for the Euros.

They wouldn't be penalised by being a new nation under the current seeding process.

----------------

As far as the European Championship Finals themselves go, we decided to go with the format of;

4 groups of 6 - top 2 qualify - 5 group games, QF, SF, Final - 8 games

This would give every nation at least 5 games, before the best 8 performing sides go on to compete in the knockout stages.

I'm writing this single handedly with no help from my team. It will be in at about 1pm. Apologies.

Yeah me too mate. People suck.

But you'd be annoyed too if you almost single handedly got yours up before the deadline and the other team wanted an extension.

And there's the buzzer. What times the boardroom Nando? I've got between now and 1pm available.

The task is over. Miky you are fired for not bothering to lead your team.

Task 3 up later

Also Fluxy told us he's out for the rest of the series.

Even though we won by default, could we have some feedback on the presentation?

I will have something up on my lunch.

Shambles.

Would never have happened on the Azzrentice.

Sorry guys.

My car was broken into last night, everything taken and the whole entertainment system ripped out, so have been on the phone to police / insurance all morning

Helpfully, I left my work laptop in the car which was also taken, so will have a bundle of laughs sorting that situation out over the rest of the week

Team Miky's proposal:

We have decided to have faith in the new Nations League which UEFA have set up. It seems reckless to scrap this without at least one attempt, so we would like to see that retained.

Under this system, 24 teams would make the European Championships, as was the case last time out.


GROUP STAGES
Split the 24 teams into four groups - A, B, C and D.
Six teams in each group, which would be determined by a seeded draw.
All teams play each other once, three games per matchday.
Teams are separated by head to head record, then goal difference.
The top two finishers in each group would make the last eight.

The group stage has each team guaranteed five games at the tournament, rather than the current three. We also believe that the Group Stage will be more competitive, with the current system seeing the top nations easily progress to the knockout stages.


KNOCKOUT STAGE
This would be a standard knockout tournament, from Quarter Final through to the Final.

To increase the drama, and to prevent any tactical 2nd place finishes in the Group, we would replace the current system of pre-determined knockouts to a random draw.


LOGISTICS
Euro 2016 saw a total of 51 games played. We are increasing the total number of games to 67. We suggest that the number of stadia is increased from 11 to 13.

Joint Bids will be encouraged from neighbouring countries, such as Spain and Portugal, the UK as one joint bid.

Each group will get its own matchday throughout, following this timeline:

Day 1 - Group A (Matchday 1)
2 - Group B (Matchday 1)
3 - Group C (Matchday 1)
4 - Group D (Matchday 1)
etc.
20 - Group D (Matchday 5)
23 - QF1 and QF2
24 - QF3 and QF4
27 - SF1
28 - SF2
31 - Final


DEVELOPMENT
Furthermore, we suggest fan consultation on two ideas to develop the competition further:
- Reinstating the 3rd/4th place game.
- Some kind of mini-tournament Europa League style for those teams which finish third in their groups.

My comments on the task - and my team-mates.

Miky said he would look into things for this task, but never contributed. We were waiting for leadership which never came - had he said right at the start he wasn't doing this task I'd have had more respect.
Nadz came up with the idea of six team groups and had an idea of wildcards, which we rejected. But did come up with a couple of ideas.
I don't recall Olly making a serious suggestion on this task, just a few joke ideas.

I did a note-form version of this yesterday, to try and get my team's view. Other than Nadz suggesting a 3rd place match and saying that I did a top job, there was no feedback.

I would be very disappointed if no official winner is given based on the best proposal, given that I have put significant time into this.

If feedback is required, Bam and I contributed, Hero scarcely took part although he did cite work issues as his excuse, and as I said Fluxy popped in to say he was out

I'll admit this task was not that appealing to me. I found it too hard to come up with any realistic ideas. Trebs did nearly all the work and must be commended for putting the time and effort in. My "Wildcard" idea was

4 groups of 6 teams
Play each other once
Top 3 from each group qualify automatically = 12 teams next round
4th placed teams of each group face off against each other in a chance to also qualify to the next round = 3 teams next round
1 more place available for the remaining teams from the groups with the best goal difference (the wildcard)
Then a knockout stage with the remaining 16 teams.
The wildcard has to face one of the group winners in a random draw.
The other groups are drawn so that the winners of each group can't play each other in the next round but can play against anyone else.

It was a bit complicated but I felt it would give a smaller nation a chance to qualify into the knockouts.

That task was awful Nando do better

Good, I'm fired.

I told the guys during the task, granted i should have said it at the start but i was not well over the weekend and just wasn't feeling up to it to be completely honest but im not sure why i signed up for this anyway as i wasn't really going to have any time during the day anyway.

Are we having any sort of feedback on this task. I am very disappointed

I'd also like feedback irrespective of our default win.

Marky wrote:I'd also like feedback irrespective of our default win.

Come on you know this is silly.

Regardless of who won, Miky and Fluxy were fired.

But it would be good if Nando could give feedback to the submitted presentations and maybe even a winner if it mattered.