Nations League draw live – Scotland to learn playoff fate plus QF ties

Top scorers from the Nations League this time:

• Gyokeres (Sweden) 9
• Haaland (Norway) 7
• Marin (Romania) 6
• Ronaldo (Portugal) 5
• Sesko (Slovenia) 5

A couple there still involved in the games to come, though Sweden – who were in League C this time around – earned comfortable promotion. Gyokeres helping himself to a bagful against Slovakia, Estonia and Azerbaijan.

So here are all the teams involved in the upcoming playoff draw, with naturally a third place playing a runner-up in each case.

A/B: Scotland, Belgium, Hungary, Serbia; Ukraine, Greece, Austria, Turkey

B/C: Georgia, Ireland, Slovenia, Iceland; Slovakia, Kosovo, Bulgaria, Armenia

C/D: Luxembourg, Latvia; Gibraltar, Malta

The finals are just one half of today’s festivities, though. We now – in addition to direct promotion and relegation for the top and bottom team of groups – have a playoff for a second potential spot each way.

Very simply, teams finishing third in Leagues A, B and C will face those finishing second from B, C or D and the winner stays or goes up accordingly.

A/B and B/C playoffs are on 20 and 23 March, C/D playoffs will be for a fairly obscure World Cup qualification reason held a year later, 26 and 31 March 2026. And might not be held at all, but we’ll worry about that at the time.

The finals previously were just semis and final; as mentioned, this year has expanded. So:

Quarter-finals are played over two legs, 20 March and 23 March 2025.

Then it’s onto the semis, a one-off game on 4 or 5 June, with the final – and a third-place playoff for extra irrelevance – taking place on 8 June 2025.

Impressive mileage from a competition few people seem to be all that bothered about, you might say. Still, it’s probably better than friendlies.

Let’s break this down then: playoffs to come, but first the ‘finals’ to sort out.

We have eight quarter-finalists, which are four seeded – the winners from League A groups – and four unseeded nations – the runners-up, naturally.

Each runner-up will be drawn against a winner, but not the one from the Nations League group they already played in. So, Portugal topped A1 ahead of Croatia, for example, so they won’t face each other again now.

Pot 1 (winners): Portugal, France, Germany, Spain

Pot 2 (r/ups): Croatia, Italy, Netherlands, Denmark

The Uefa Nations League has undergone changes this season, with the addition of quarter-finals to the knockout stage as well as promotion/relegation play-offs at the conclusion of the first phase.

That, incredibly, includes Scotland , who rescued themselves from automatic relegation with back-to-back wins over Croatia and Poland to end the campaign in third place of Group A1. Andy Robertson’s dramatic winner in Warsaw means Steve Clarke’s side will play one of the runners-up from League B over a two-legged play-off in March, in a bid to preserve their top-tier status.

Meanwhile, Spain are the defending Nations League champions and will be out to retain their crown against the likes of France, Portugal, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands in the Nations League finals.

The draw takes place today and here’s everything you need to know.

Morning all – if you thought the international break was done, you’ve jumped the gun. We’ve one more notable activity to take care of first before the domestic game returns to our screens and scenes: the Nations League draw.

That’s coming up at 11am GMT, with plenty of build-up and explanation beforehand as well as the draw itself.