The Football Association has thrown its weight behind plans to revamp the European qualifying format for major international tournaments amid fears the process has become stale.
Uefa is concerned that fans and broadcasters are no longer engaged by current routes to the World Cup and European Championship. Expanded tournaments have removed a considerable element of jeopardy and there is an acceptance that fundamental changes must be implemented to reignite interest.
England have cruised to qualification for the 48-team 2026 World Cup with two games to spare, their match against Serbia on Thursday night barely relevant after they won an uninspiring group that also includes Albania, Latvia and Andorra. It has become a procession for bigger countries and the FA’s chief executive, Mark Bullingham, believes it is time to refresh the model.
“I think it’s really important to overhaul it,” he said. “I think we need to keep looking at ways to make international football even better and there’s genuine appetite to do that. Uefa are clearly leading that, but I’m one of a group of countries that’s helping them to look at options.”
Bullingham sits on a Uefa working group examining alternative formats. One potential move is to adopt a version of the Champions League-style Swiss system model where, rather than face a handful of sides twice in one smaller group, a range of opponents are faced once and teams are placed in one league table. It would mean Europe’s giants potentially encounter at least one similarly ranked team. An alternative could be that the Nations League, which has proved attractive to supporters and television companies, holds greater sway in deciding who qualifies.
The FA chair, Debbie Hewitt, echoed Bullingham’s stance. “Football changes, the world changes, the number of tournaments changes, the number of teams playing in those tournaments changes,” she said. “So if we stick with the same model of qualification it’s probably going to get bent out of shape. I think we have to keep looking at challenging.”
Hewitt suggested the existing group format would be retained for Euro 2028 and ruled out a pre-qualifying event for lower-ranked teams.
In October the Uefa president, Aleksander Ceferin, confirmed discussions were under way. “There won’t be any more matches but a more interesting format,” he said.
Bullingham and Hewitt were speaking at a launch event in London for Euro 2028, which will take place across the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland. Ticket prices are yet to be announced but Bullingham confirmed dynamic pricing, controversially adopted by Fifa for next year’s World Cup, will not be used.
“There won’t be any dynamic ticket pricing,” he said. “I think that’s really well established. [There are a] couple of basic principles. One is not dynamic ticket pricing, and the other one is that approximately half of the tickets will be in category three, and also the fan first category, which is the category below that. So we’re really confident there will be a lot of accessible ticket prices.”
