{"id":115132,"date":"2026-02-12T22:33:00","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T22:33:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=115132"},"modified":"2026-02-12T22:33:00","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T22:33:00","slug":"england-to-face-spain-and-croatia-in-nations-league","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/?p=115132","title":{"rendered":"England to face Spain and Croatia in Nations League"},"content":{"rendered":"
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England will face Spain, Croatia and the Czech Republic in the 2026-27 Uefa Nations League group stage, while Wales are in the same group as champions Portugal.<\/p>\n

England and Wales, who will also play Denmark and Norway in a bid to qualify for the knockout stages, both secured promotion to League A in the 2024-2025 competition.<\/p>\n

Scotland, who will compete at their first World Cup since 1998 this summer, will meet Switzerland, Slovenia and North Macedonia in their League B group.<\/p>\n

Also in League B, Northern Ireland will play Hungary, Ukraine, and Georgia, while the Republic of Ireland will face Israel, Austria, and Kosovo.<\/p>\n

The fifth edition of the Uefa Nations League will take place between September 2026 and June 2027.<\/p>\n

The competition features four groups each containing four teams in Leagues A, B and C, and two groups of three teams in League D.<\/p>\n

Portugal beat neighbours Spain in a penalty shootout to win their\u00a0second Nations League trophy\u00a0last summer.<\/p>\n

England, runners-up to Spain at Euro 2024, topped their group when they were drawn alongside Spain and Croatia in the 2018-19 Nations League.<\/p>\n

The draw took place on the same day that Thomas Tuchel extended his contract as England manager through to Euro 2028.<\/p>\n

German Tuchel, tasked with leading the Three Lions to World Cup glory this summer, told BBC Sport: \u201cYou need to forgive me if I am not fully focused on the Nations League.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt seems like a difficult group. It\u2019s Croatia again, Spain \u2013 we need to figure out after the World Cup how we approach this period.\u201d<\/p>\n

UEFA Nations League 2026-27 draw in full<\/h2>\n

League A<\/strong><\/p>\n

Group A1: France, Italy, Belgium, Turkey<\/p>\n

Group A2: Germany, Netherlands, Serbia, Greece<\/p>\n

Group A3: Spain, Croatia,\u00a0England<\/strong>, Czech Republic<\/p>\n

Group A4: Portugal, Denmark, Norway,\u00a0Wales<\/strong><\/p>\n

League B<\/strong><\/p>\n

Group B1:\u00a0Scotland<\/strong>, Switzerland, Slovenia, North Macedonia<\/p>\n

Group B2: Hungary, Ukraine, Georgia,\u00a0Northern Ireland<\/strong><\/p>\n

Group B3: Israel, Austria,\u00a0Republic of Ireland<\/strong>, Kosovo<\/p>\n

Group B4: Poland, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Romania, Sweden<\/p>\n

League C<\/strong><\/p>\n

Group C1: Albania, Finland, Belarus, San Marino<\/p>\n

Group C2: Montenegro, Armenia, Cyprus, Gibraltar\/Latvia*<\/p>\n

Group C3: Kazakhstan, Slovakia, Faroe Islands, Moldova<\/p>\n

Group C4: Iceland, Bulgaria, Estonia, Luxembourg\/Malta*<\/p>\n

League D<\/strong><\/p>\n

Group D1: Gibraltar\/Latvia, Luxembourg\/Malta, Andorra<\/p>\n

Group D2: Lithuania, Azerbaijan, Liechtenstein<\/p>\n

*Gibraltar and Latvia, and Luxembourg and Malta, will contest play-offs in March to determine who will play in Leagues C and D.<\/em><\/p>\n

Republic of Ireland will play Israel games<\/h2>\n

The Football Association of Ireland (FAI) confirmed the Republic of Ireland \u201cwill fulfil\u201d their Nations League fixtures against Israel after they were drawn together in Group B3.<\/p>\n

In November, the FAI\u00a0approved a motion to call on UEFA to ban Israel\u00a0from European club and international competitions for \u201cviolating two independent provisions of the Uefa statutes\u201d.<\/p>\n

The \u201cviolations\u201d cited were the \u201corganisation of clubs in illegal settlements in the occupied West Bank without the consent of the Palestinian Football Association\u201d and a \u201cfailure to implement and enforce an effective anti-racism policy\u201d.<\/p>\n

Following Thursday\u2019s draw, the FAI said: \u201cWhile consultation has taken place with UEFA officials, the association does recognise that UEFA regulations outline that if an association refuses to play a match, then that fixture will be forfeited and further disciplinary measures may follow \u2013 including potential disqualification from the competition.\u201d<\/p>\n

How does the Nations League work?<\/h2>\n
Image caption,The draw for the 2026-27 Uefa Nations League took place in Belgium on Thursday<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Each team in the Nations League will face every other team in their group twice, once at home and once away, between September and November 2026.<\/p>\n

The top two teams from each group in League A progress to the quarter-finals, held in March 2027, before the semi-finals and final take place in June to determine the overall Nations League winner.<\/p>\n

Each group winner in Leagues B, C, and D will be promoted by one league, while the teams finishing bottom of their groups in Leagues A, B, and C will be relegated to the next level.<\/p>\n

The teams finishing second in Leagues B, C and D will enter the relegation play-offs against teams finishing third in Leagues A, B and C.<\/p>\n

As an extra incentive, the best-performing teams in the Nations League that do not directly qualify for the 2028 European Championships will enter into play-offs to earn the final spots at that tournament.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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England will face Spain, Croatia and the Czech Republic in the 2026-27 Uefa Nations League group stage, while Wales are in the same group as champions Portugal.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_2277560469115098_106292521332774":"","twitter_aToxNzczMzI3Njk4OTg4ODUxMjAxOw==_1773327698988851200":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[10661,4306,137,16813,10,9,2488],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-115132","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-croatia","category-england","category-football","category-nations-league","category-politics","category-popular","category-spain"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115132","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=115132"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/115132\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=115132"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=115132"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sotnews.agency\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=115132"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}