Ireland have given their hopes of reaching next summer’s World Cup a massive boost with their back-to-back wins over Poland last week.

Carla Ward’s side took maximum points from the two games against their main rivals for third place in the group, a position which would guarantee them a seeded route through the playoffs en route to next year’s tournament in Brazil.

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Back-to-back qualifications would be a remarkable achievement for the Girls in Green, and their results against the Poles have certainly raised hopes that Irish fans could be basking in the Copacabana sun next July.

Though a seeded route through the playoffs is the most likely outcome now for Ireland, there is a slight chance that they could yet qualify automatically for the tournament.

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Ireland’s road to the World Cup

Here’s how things stand in Ireland’s World Cup qualifying group, with two games remaining.

Ireland’s World Cup qualifying group: Table

Nations League A2

Pos
Team
Pld
W
D
L
GF
GA
GD
Pts

1
Netherlands
4
2
2
0
7
5
+2
8
Qualify automatically for World Cup

2
France
4
2
1
1
8
5
+3
7
Seeded for World Cup playoffs

3
Ireland
4
2
0
2
6
6
0
6

4
Poland
4
0
1
3
5
10
-5
1
Unseeded for playoffs and relegated to Nations League B

Ireland have two games remaining in their qualifying group.

Firstly, they will host the Netherlands in SuperValu Páirc Uí Chaoimh in Cork on Friday June 5th (tickets are on sale for the final home game here).

Four days later, they will face Les Bleues in Grenoble in the final round of group games (Netherlands v Poland will kick off concurrently in Almelo, but kick-off times have yet to be confirmed by UEFA).

Ireland are guaranteed a playoff for a World Cup place by virtue of their spot in Nations League A.

Read our full explainer of the unnecessarily-complicated format here

Should Ireland pick up a single point from either game, or Poland fail to beat France on June 5th, Ireland will be guaranteed at least a seeded playoff route to the World Cup (and will retain their Nations League A status).

However, things could end up even better for Ireland.

Only top spot in each group will qualify automatically for the World Cup, but Carla Ward’s Irish troops could yet top their group. They will finish 1st in any of the following two scenarios:

Ireland beat both the Netherlands and France in their final two group games
Ireland beat the Netherlands; France and the Netherlands both fail to beat Poland; and Ireland draw with France in Grenoble

Two caveats – either Ireland would need to beat the Netherlands by two or more goals to ensure they would win out on head-to-head in the event of a draw between the Dutch and Poland; or they would need the Netherlands to lose to Poland on the final day

Both of those scenarios are extremely unlikely to transpire, but Ireland could yet secure a runners-up spot with a win against either the Netherlands or France.

That could yet prove important further down the line, with the final Nations League standings set to decide which of the eight playoff winners progresses to an intercontinental playoff instead of qualifying for the World Cup.

Stranger things have happened, and Ireland were less than 15 minutes away from big results against both the French and Dutch in the first window of qualifiers.

Even if both of the above scenarios are longshots, that we are having these discussions at all this deep into a World Cup qualifying campaign is a credit to Carla Ward’s Ireland team.

Ireland’s World Cup qualifying group: Fixtures

All times listed in Irish time

Round five

Friday June 5th: Ireland v Netherlands (Cork, 7:30pm)
Friday June 5th: Poland v France (Gdansk, TBC)

Round six

Tuesday June 9th: France v Ireland (Grenoble, TBC)
Tuesday June 9th: Netherlands v Poland (Almelo, TBC)

Who could Ireland face in a World Cup playoff?

The playoffs are split into two paths with eight matches in each. The Path 1 winners will then be seeded against Path 2 winners in the second round of eight ties, which will decide the teams going to the World Cup.

Path 1 is where Ireland want to be, as they would be guaranteed to face League C opposition in the first round of playoffs. They will be placed in Path 1 if they finish 2nd or 3rd in their group, which they are now overwhelmingly likely to do.

As it stands, their potential opponents are listed below (world rankings in brackets).

Round 1 (League C group winners and best two runners-up): Bosnia-Herzegovina (67th), Kosovo (81st), Hungary (47th), Greece (60th), Romania (48th), Belarus (54th), Kazakhstan (97th), Estonia (102nd)

Round one of the playoffs will take place in late October, with round two in late November/early December. The draw for the playoffs will be made on June 24th.

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