Soccer-UEFA Nations League to have new knockout round after 2024 | The Mighty 790 KFGO

GENEVA (Reuters) – The UEFA Nations League will be expanded with a new knockout round after 2024, European football’s governing body said on Wednesday after its executive committee meeting in Nyon, Germany. Swiss.

The round of 16 will be played in March and will create continuity between the group stage ending in November and the finals in June.

The winners and runners-up of the League A group will advance to the quarter-finals in a home-and-away format, with the winners advancing to the bottom four.

The third-placed team in League A and second-placed in League B, as well as the third-placed League B side and second-placed in League C will play a two-way promotion and relegation playoff.

“By introducing the new knockout stage, teams will have even more opportunities to progress while maintaining the same number of matches in the international fixture list,” said UEFA President Aleksander Ceferin.

In another change, European qualifying for the European Championship and World Cup will be more consolidated, with teams being drawn into 12 groups of four and five teams.

“The predictability of European qualifiers was also discussed and addressed, with a new format that will give all teams an equal chance of qualifying for major tournaments,” added Ceferin.

The new formats for these competitions will come into effect in September 2024, UEFA said in a statement.

Russia, which sent officials from its football union to Switzerland to meet UEFA a day before the executive committee meeting, has been banned from participating in or hosting UEFA or FIFA competitions after its invasion of Ukraine last year.

UEFA has decided that Russia, which hosted the 2018 Men’s World Cup, cannot participate in qualifying for Euro 2024, which will take place in March.

This year’s UEFA Super Cup has been moved from Kazan, Russia to Athens, Greece.

(Reporting by Manasi Pathak in Bangalore, additional reporting by Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber in Geneva; editing by Ed Osmond)