You connect to a UK server, closer the better.

I usually connect to a netherlands one, hardly any slowdown and find it works better than a uk one for me anyway, using ipvanish

What sort of quality are you getting on football channels? 1080p?

close to UK not UK

I believe the "Quick Connect" or whatever it's called on Nord (and with most providers) bases the server it selects lowest PING time. UK servers typically aren't bad on Nord, but I have noticed from other usage (not IPTV related) that France and Netherlands as mentioned are generally stable and fast.

The point is to find a server that works for you, if the France one works stick to it.

i noticed something interesting doing my own experimentation today. i don't post this to contradict some of the good advice here, only to supplement it.

while logically you should outlet as close as you can to the content producer, that may not be where the content is best being routed from. and since we may use the same iptv with a wide variety of content around the world, the question is what one outlet is the best choice if you don't want to keep changing it (practical for those who vpn off their router).

i'm in nyc, i was outlet in toronto most often watching content originating from us/ca, however i tracert'd my iptv provider and discovered he's in the middle of europe, so i did various latency and speed test to different euro vpn outlet and picked one.

the results were far fewer hickups and retries on live streams, and far fewer lockups and restarts on vod streams. my point is don't only consider the content source, better to consider where the content redistributor is also located when choosing the best vpn outlet city.

good luck