The Union of European Football Associations, UEFA, decided to create a new tournament called the UEFA Nations League. The current international break is the final part of the group stages of this tournament. Now it’s time to talk about the pros and cons of this new tournament.
Nations League pros
- Reduced number of friendlies: The international breaks used to be filled with friendly matches. These matches were almost never interesting to watch. Since the introduction of the Nations League we’ve seen lot less friendlies and more interesting matches. Let alone take two off yesterday’s matches. Both England versus Croatia and Switzerland versus Belgium were some very excited matches.
- More top matches: With all the best teams placed in Nations League division A there are a lot of great matches to watch. It was just this weekend that we’ve seen matches like England versus Croatia, Holland versus France and Germany versus Holland.
Nations League Cons
- Keeps a busy schedule: Something that irritates a lof of players is their busy schedule. I was looking into Liverpool’s schedule for this December and noticed they play 8 matches in December. Which basically means they will play a match every three days. Without the Nations League there is more room in the agenda for club football, which will give the players more rest.
- Nobody understands it: I’ve been asking a lot of people if they can tell me what the UEFA Nations League really is. Nobody was able to explain it to me. We know there is a little tournament in the summer with semis and a final, but the winner of this tournament still needs to play regular qualification matches for the Euro 2020. It’s much better when there really is a place in the Euros at stake.
Now we’ve listed some pros and cons, what is your opinion on this tournament? Should we keep it or was it a failed test?