Nations League 2022 Group B1

Thats the spirit! 

Assuming we finish in 3rd spot are we going to be the 3rd seeds in the qualifying draw or could we be second seeds? 

I don't think they'll repeat that performance and I expect we'll win. 

It can still disappointing even if it’s our best in terms of result’s.

And if you want to be technical we got a playoff spot out of one of our previous nations league campaigns and don’t look like getting one now

( of course this could change if we win or next two games)

Ultimately a country like us needs to get something out of the nations league especially if we are now in  pot 3 for the qualifiers

I agree fully re the asterisk, we still have it all to prove in the next campaign, but I'm a lot more positive about our chances for Euro 2024 now than I was at the start of this campaign.

Also, just one point re this "weaker" teams concept, because we hear this all the time, as if teams ranked below us traditionally cannot improve considerably. The whole point of the Nations League is to pair teams of roughly similar ability, based on results over the previous couple of campaigns, in groups of 4 in order to provide a competitive schedule. That being the case I find it a little annoying at times (not necessarily directed at yourself) to see teams like Armenia being talked about as if they are an Andorra or San Marino. They made it up to Division B on merit, so they arent desperate and will probably be just one seeding below us for the Euro Qualifiers. That's not to say the Irish team we all want to see shouldnt be beating them, but I think there is a somewhat skewed perspective around "weaker" teams on here at times. By definition a team in Group B is going to be competitive with ourselves, given that I think most agree we are nowhere near being a Division A team just yet.

Armenia was a perfect example of a terrible result despite a decent performance. The first Ukraine game was the only performance of the 4 I've been really disappointed with, we offered nothing after the first 15 minutes in that game.

While the Armenia result was hugely disappointing and detrimental to our hopes of getting anything tangible from the group, the other performances have been pretty good. Our squad looks in much better shape than it did before the campaign started with nearly all of our players now plying their trade regularly at Championship level or higher. 

If we can round off the campaign with 2 good performances and actually beat Armenia convincingly at home, then while the outcome of the campaign may indeed be classified as poor, the actual progression of the team and the improvement in the depth of the squad can at least be viewed as real positives heading in to the next campaign. I hope we can look forward with a degree of hope and optimism that has been lacking for quite some time, both from a player and fan perspective, come next Wednesday.