Luxembourg’s hopes of qualifying for a first-ever major international tournament took a dent when the team lost to Slovakia in what had previously been pinned the decisive moment of the campaign. However, a second chance could still provide a much-needed saving grace.

A tough to stomach result

Luxembourg’s men’s national football team lost 0-1 to Slovakia at a fully packed Stade de Luxembourg on Monday night. It was a frustrating evening where none of the first-half dominance showed itself on the scoreline, while a spark in attack from the guests was able to tip the scales in their favour.

The narrow loss came after a 1-1 draw on a cold Friday night in Reykjavík, Iceland, as the team bounced back from a tough first-half position to clinch what was seen as a crucial point going into the home game against Slovakia.

Historic feat for the controversial returnee

Wide forward Gerson Rodrigues had a particularly successful international window, as he became the country’s record goalscorer when he found the net against Iceland from a well-placed effort from distance in the 46th minute. It was his 17th goal in 55 appearances for the country, passing the previous leader on the list, Leon Mart, who registered 16 goals in a mere 24 games in the 1930s and 1940s. Rodrigues made his Rout Léiwen debut at the age of 21, playing for Fola Esch. In the subsequent six years, he has played for 9 clubs in 7 different countries, mostly playing bit-part roles after strong starts to his stints. He is currently on loan at Turkish side Sivasspor, where he has 2 goals in 4 Süper Lig appearances.

Gerson had been frozen out of national team contention earlier this year amid a fallout with Luc Holtz and a court case that has been lingering around him for months. Police investigated him in the June international window, and he left the camp after the 2-0 win against Liechtenstein. He is facing allegations of three counts of physical assault and causing bodily harm related to three separate incidents dating from 2019 to 2022. However, national team manager Luc Holtz stated that footballers’ private lives would not have an impact on their chances to be selected.

If the Sivasspor forward is to be found guilty, he could potentially be facing a two-year prison sentence. The next court hearing is on Monday.

Play-off offers last glimpse of hope

Despite this already being Luxembourg’s most prolific qualifying campaign for a major tournament in history, gaining 11 points from 8 games so far, the top two places that would mean automatic Euro 2024-spots now seem to be falling out of reach after the loss to Slovakia.

With a five-point gap in place and two games to go, it would require an extraordinary set of circumstances for Luxembourg to fight back and finish in second place. Beating Bosnia and Herzegovina at home and Liechtenstein away would only go halfway towards meeting the requirements, as Slovakia would also have to lose both of their matches (against Iceland and Bosnia) to succumb to the Luxembourgish efforts.

As that seems highly unlikely, all that is left for the two November games is for Holtz to perhaps find other working tactical structures and give more opportunities to players on the fringes of the team. Youngsters could be expecting to get more minutes in the final two matches of the calendar year.

Regardless of the chance to finish second being squandered, though, there is still a route for the country to write history and make an appearance at next summer’s group stage in Germany. That is due to their successful Nations League campaign of 2022-23, where they finished second in their group behind Türkiye and above the Faroe Islands and Lithuania, also achieving the best second-placed points tally in all groups across Division C.

Thanks to Türkiye’s success in qualifying for the tournament via their group, Luxembourg will get the spot they vacated in the four-team play-off round, alongside the winners of the other three Nations League groups.

Not every team's destiny is as straightforwardly mapped out as Luxembourg’s, but we can have a rough idea of how the play-off field will be looking like. At the moment, Georgia vs Luxembourg is one semi-final (held in Tbilisi, Georgia), with Greece vs Kazakhstan being the other. After one-legged ties, the two winners would battle it out in the final for one Euros spot.

The above is subject to minor changes and should not be taken as a guarantee yet. Kazakhstan still maintain a realistic chance of qualifying through their group, which would mean Luxembourg travelling to Greece and Georgia hosting Azerbaijan, another second-placed Nations League team, instead.

Both semi-finals and the final will be held in late March, months after ticket sales for the group stage begin. A number of tickets are set to be provided to fans of teams whose places at the tournament will still be in doubt by the time the sales start. Tickets for any play-off game are likely to be on the market come winter, while the final venue (in case Luxembourg get that far) is yet unclear, and will be determined by a random draw between the two countries involved.