A ridiculously early start to this thread because some of those at Braehead over the weekend were asking which teams we might meet next year and where.

I tweeted the possibilities yesterday but this list now takes into account the late result from the HUN v LAT  Group II R2 tie and something I realised I had missed seconds after tweeting  - i.e. the fact that R2 losers POR and ROU are not yet definitely in Group I next year because, unlike us, they had byes in R1 so still need to win relegation ties to survive.

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Teams we could meet in R1 or R2 next year ... blue if it would be a home tie, red if it would be an away tie, black if home/away would be decided by lot because we haven't played them since 1970:

These teams will be in Euro Africa Zone Group I next year if they lose their WGPO ties in September:

Switzerland
Germany (home if ties against the old West Germany are relevant to home/away here - I think they are - otherwise by lot)
Russia
Belgium
Israel
Italy
Netherlands
South Africa
Sweden

These teams will stay in Euro Africa Zone Group I with us next year under the following conditions:

Finland - if they win in Romania in September or lose in Romania but then win at home to Denmark in October
Denmark - if they win away to the losers of Romania v Finland in October
Portugal - if they win in the Slovak Republic in September
Romania - if they win at home to Finland in September or lose to Finland but then win at home to Denmark in October
Slovak Rep - if they win at home to Portugal in September
Slovenia - like us, already definitely in Group I for 2013

These teams will be promoted from Euro Africa Zone Group II if they win in September:

The winners of Latvia v Ukraine
The winners of Poland v Belarus

Dates

September 2012 ties are 14-16 Sep and the final relegation playoff tie (DEN v losers of FIN v ROU) is 19-21 Oct.

DC dates for 2013 are 1-3 Feb for Round 1 and 5-7 Apr for Round 2, with WGPO ties due to be played on 13-15 Sep.

As you can see from the above, there is an even higher chance of having to play away next year, though there was a very high chance this year too, and we somehow avoided it ... twice!

In some ways it might be a pity that we got yet more home ties this year, because it means there are two more teams (SVK and BEL) that we are next due to play away - though if we hadn't had that home tie in February, we might have been staring relegation in the face right now.

However, it does mean that if, say, Andy wins a slam and then decides to play DC more often, GB could be faced with a long run of away ties as in 2003-5, when we had 6 away ties in a row and did not get a home tie in any of those 3 years.

Let's hope it will never be that bad again ... but remember that since that run of away ties, no less than 13 of our last 16 ties have been at home, including 9 of the last 10 and all of the last 6!

The one prediction I am prepared to make is that if we end up with a home tie against Switzerland at some point next year and both Andy and Fed seem likely to play, it probably won't be played at Braehead.

-- Edited by steven on Monday 9th of April 2012 04:54:39 PM