Euro 2024 Power Rankings: Austria top-ranked side in bottom half of lopsided knockout draw
We’re down to the knockouts at Euro 2024 now which means some important and in many cases final adjustments to our Very Scientific ranking of all 24 teams, with the resurgent hosts among a really quite strikingly large number of teams with tremendously plausible reason to dream.
Sure, this is arbitrary but we’re making a rare genuine tilt for objectivity here. The top six are the group winners. The 24th team is the one that went out after two games. Twenty-third is the team that went out after 100 minutes of their third game. And so forth. See? Objective. Fair. Plucked only in part direct from our fetid anus.
Keep checking back throughout the tournament as we shuttle teams up and down in response to the ongoing action and to correct our humiliating, embarrassing mistakes. Arrows indicate which teams have been on the move and in which direction since the last update.
24) Poland 🟰
Poland and major tournaments, name a more underwhelming combination. We’ll wait. It’s genuinely almost impressive to get knocked out after two games in a format with a whopping great safety net, but Poland have managed it. Just forever and always a complete waste of a tournament place.
23) Scotland 🟰
Oh, Scotland. Oh, mates. Twelve major tournaments, twelve group stage exits. The despairing “You couldn’t make it up” on the BBC commentary after a 100th-minute goal for Hungary confirmed Scotland’s exit may well be the most inaccurate single line of commentary in sports history. It’s very easy to make it up. Although we suppose it is also very unnecessary to actually do so. It is the history of the Scotland.
22) Czechia ⬇️
A narrow late defeat to Portugal was frustrating but need not have been terminal. Only drawing with Georgia was far more costly, and their early exit was confirmed by defeat to Turkey. Given the group they were in and the quality they possess, Czechia have to go down as one of the tournament’s biggest disappointments.
21) Serbia ⬆️
Turns out they were doomed from the moment they lost to England, with losing a game – to England or anyone else – proving something nobody else was going to bother with in Group C thank you very much.
20) Albania ⬆️
Absolutely didn’t disgrace themselves in the Group of Death, taking a deserved point against Croatia in between narrow defeats to Italy and Spain.
19) Ukraine ⬇️
Sympathy abounds for a team finishing bottom of their group with four points, but that crushing game-one defeat against Romania always had potential to be costly and they didn’t do enough against Belgium in a game they had to win against a team short on confidence.
18) Croatia ⬆️
Conceding a heartbreaking 98th-minute equaliser against Italy and then waiting 24 hours to see your hopes finally extinguished by England failing to beat Slovenia 3-0 is a horrible way to go, and who knows how many of their remaining legends will still be around for another crack at the World Cup in two years’ time. They looked a very old side this summer.
17) Hungary ⬇️
Very lucky to finish third in Group A, very unlucky to miss out on a qualification spot at the very last thanks to Georgia’s historic win over Portugal. But in truth, Hungary have been a disappointment at these finals. ‘Best of the sides eliminated in the group stage’ is not a title they would have wanted to take home from Germany.
16) Slovenia ⬇️
Reaching the knockout stage is very much ‘everything else is a bonus’ territory for Slovenia, but they are a fabulously well organised team who will go into that last-16 clash against Portugal on the back of what is now a nine-game unbeaten run.
15) Slovakia ⬆️
Got the draw they needed against Romania to secure third place in Group E and with it a well deserved place in the last 16. England await, and absolutely nothing we’ve seen from either side thus far suggests Slovakia should be quaking in their boots about that.
14) Georgia ⬆️
Beating Portugal to snatch the final last-16 spot is one of the moments of the tournament from a side making their first appearance at a major. Spain ought to have too much in the last 16, but we said that about Portugal in the last group match as well.
13) Netherlands ⬇️
Have landed on their feet after finishing third in Group D, with Romania up next followed by Austria or Turkey in the quarter-final if the Dutch get past the Group E winners. Arguably, therefore, even luckier than England. But they really haven’t been convincing as yet in a tournament where they’ve had to come from behind to beat a very ordinary Poland and lost deservedly to Austria.
12) Denmark ⬆️
Could have won all of their group games, didn’t win any, still came second in the group anyway, but now face Germany with Spain likely to follow if they can somehow get through that. What a curious ride it has been for Denmark, one that seems unlikely on this occasion now to lead all the way to the semi-finals as it did three years ago.
11) Belgium ⬇️
Failure to find a winner against Ukraine in their final game looks like a costly mistake, leaving them second in a group where all four teams finished with four points and thus facing France in the nasty half of the draw instead of Netherlands in the nice half.
10) Italy 🟰
Scraped into the knockouts in wildly unconvincing fashion after a narrow win over Albania, defeat to Spain and a last-gasp draw against Croatia.
Far from convincing, but their tournament pedigree is known and they are sitting comfortably in the kinder half of the draw. Simply cannot be ruled out despite the evidence of our eyes, ears and gut.
9) Turkey ⬆️
Second place in a group containing Portugal is very acceptable for a team who had so many scars from their miserable campaign three years ago when so many tipped them as dark horses. And impressive as Austria have been, there’s no denying Turkey will be pleasantly surprised to find that second place in Group F sees them facing up to Ralf Rangnick’s side rather than France or the Netherlands.
They’re three years late, but they’ve justified that dark horse status in the end.
MORE ON EURO 2024 FROM F365
👉 Euro 2024 group-stage permutations and third-place rankings
👉 Ranking all 24 Euro 2024 away kits: Spain done dirty while Portugal and France dazzle
👉 Euro 2024 squads: England, Germany, France, Spain, Portugal, Georgia and the rest
8) Switzerland 🟰
Minutes away from topping their group and leaping even higher here, but they’ve been hugely impressive thus far. Nothing we’ve seen from either side thus far gives any indication that Switzerland should fear taking on holders Italy in the last 16.
Not for nothing are these lads our officially endorsed Dark Horses.
7) France 🟰
Really, really isn’t going to plan for a France side whose only goals in Germany thus far have been an own goal and a penalty and who, by failing to beat eliminated Poland on matchday three, have rather clumsily inserted themselves into the far more difficult Germany-Spain-Portugal half of the draw.
Still have such an abundance of quality that the possibility they suddenly click remains high. But equally they may be about to crash out in the last 16 as they did three years ago, with a repeat of the 2018 World Cup semi-final against Belgium now in store in the last 16.
They really aren’t playing well thus far. But they do look absolutely magnificent going about their business.
6) Romania ⬆️
A draw against Slovakia suited both sides in the end, but there was no hint of a carve-up in a full-blooded 1-1 draw. That, coupled with Belgium’s failure to beat Ukraine, means Romania win Group E and land on the soft side of the draw. A chance now of doing something incredible.
5) England ⬆️
Quite bad against Serbia, properly, abysmally sh*t against Denmark, and maybe just a tiny bit better than that against Slovenia? Somehow, though, this has all added up to a group-topping five-point haul and a cushy spot in the easier half of the draw. England always seem to find their way there. Say what you like about Southgate, he is a flawless operator when it comes to getting England into the easier side of a tournament knockout bracket.
4) Portugal ⬇️
Tournament momentum is a fickle beast and Portugal toyed with it in a tame defeat to Georgia. It doesn’t cost them anything yet, having already secured top spot in Group F, but it raises doubts and casts what they did in those first two games in a different light. They weren’t convincing against a Czechia side who looked deeply ordinary in their two subsequent games, benefited from some outrageous gifts against Turkey and have now lost to a side that had never won a major tournament game before.
And they’re on the wrong side of the draw. It is, in truth, about as bad a situation as you can be in after winning your first two games.
3) Austria ⬆️
Brilliant 3-2 winners over the Netherlands and then got an unexpected helping hand from France and Poland to end up top of Group D having gone into the final game not even entirely mathematically certain of a place in the last 16.
Have also positioned themselves now in the easier side of the draw. A side of the draw in which we now have them as the highest ranked team…
2) Germany 🟰
Hope you all enjoyed those recent tournaments where one could freely write off the Germans. Those days are over, and Germany are back. And if there were any lingering doubts after watching them score seven goals in their first two games, then that late, late group-winning equaliser against Switzerland should leave us all in no doubt. Be afraid, be very afraid.
1) Spain 🟰
Three wins out of three in what looked on paper a tough group means Spain have to leapfrog Germany and their pitiful seven-point haul. That’s just maths.
