World Cup Qualifying: European Zone Roundup

Tuesday night saw the conclusion of the main stage of Europe's qualifying for the next years World Cup in Brazil, with the eight teams earning their ticket to next year's tournament now decided. For another eight teams, 180 minutes comes between them and the plane to South America, and a nervous wait lies ahead. For teams such as The Netherlands, Germany and Belgium, their progression was already guaranteed, but for others, a tense last game a football was needed to assure their fate. The final round of group fixture threw up some interesting results and stories from around the continent, even aside from England's victory against Poland. 

Group A

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Belgium	10	8	2	0	18	4	+14	26
Croatia	10	5	2	3	12	9	+3	17
Serbia	10	4	2	4	18	11	+7	14
Scotland	10	3	2	5	8	12	−4	11
Wales	10	3	1	6	9	20	−11	10
Macedonia	10	2	1	7	7	16	−9	7

Belgium had already secured their first spot at the finals since 2002 last week, and ended with a draw at home against Wales. I for one am interested as to how a team that  many are now favouring will fare in Brazil. This result can be seen as a good result for the Welsh, as in form Aaron Ramsey scored a late equaliser, after Chelsea's Kevin De Bruyne gave the Belgians the lead. This secured a credible away draw, in one of Belgium's only two games that didn't result in a win. Scotland also gained a impressive 2-0 victory against play-off spot winning Croatia. Croatia's play-off place was already assured. The group went the way many expected, with Belgium's new golden generation storming through to Brazil. As for the two home nations, Scotland will have wanted more from their campaign, with qualification being impossible from very early on. Wales can consider their efforts respectable, especially with this being a tournament with them being one of the bottom seeds. 

Group B

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Italy	10	6	4	0	19	9	+10	22
Denmark	10	4	4	2	17	12	+5	16
Czech Republic	10	4	3	3	13	9	+4	15
Bulgaria	10	3	4	3	14	9	+5	13
Armenia	10	4	1	5	12	13	−1	13
Malta	10	1	0	9	5	28	−23	3

Italy were unbeaten in their efforts to qualify for Brazil and the Italians will be hungry for success after a extremely disappointing defence of their crown in South Africa four years ago. Cesare Prandelli's men conquered this group with relative ease to progress. Despite this, they could only manage a 2-2 draw at home to Armenia on Tuesday. Armenia themselves may be disappointed with their campaign, despite this draw against the group winners, as the ex Soviet nation are steadily improving, with players such as new Borussia Dortmund player; Henrikh Mkhitaryan, who scored Armenia's second goal. This disappointment can be summed up with a home loss to bottom of the group Malta. The Czech Republic might also count themselves as underachievers; never really surmounting the higher placed teams in the group. My greatest commiserations though, go to Denmark, who despite a 6-0 win against Malta on Tuesday, are the unlucky worst second place team, that do not earn a play-off spot. (This is due to 8 spots being available and 9 groups in the competition). Italy were definitely the clear favourites from the start, but unfortunately the other points were shared more evenly in a way that meant Denmark scored low for a second place team. This means that the best striker in the world, Nicklas Bendtner, won't be at the World Cup. I just want someone to buy him. Please. 



Group C

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Germany	10	9	1	0	36	10	+26	28
Sweden	10	6	2	2	19	14	+5	20
Austria	10	5	2	3	20	10	+10	17
Republic of Ireland	10	4	2	4	16	17	−1	14
Kazakhstan	10	1	2	7	6	21	−15	5
Faroe Islands	10	0	1	9	4	29	−25	1

Unsurprisingly, Germany came out clear winners in this group prior to Tuesday's matches, with the potential world champions' only blemish coming in an incredible 4-4 against Sweden in which the Swedes, were 4-0 behind. The return fixture played on Tuesday also saw the ball hit the back of the net 8 times with the final score being 5-3 to the Germans. The Republic's campaign was unsuccessful, with Giovanni Trapattoni's departure inevitable. Their 3-1 victory at home to Kazakhstan earlier this week, was overshadowed by a glorious goal by Kazakh, Dmitry Shomko, that is well worth looking up if you haven't seen it. On the contrary, Austria's campaign sees a massive improvement from the side that hosted the Euros in 2008, in which they slipped to their lowest ranking ever of 105. This resurgence makes the team seem far from the team of 5 years ago that had a petition against them in which 10,000 people wished for the national team to not play in their own tournament to spare the embarrassment. (I'd like to point out the last week the Faroe Islands drew with Kazakhstan, and their under 21s lost 3-2 to Germany on Tuesday, after I said I believe they can get results.) Sweden have been ranked as one of the lower seeds for the play-offs.


Group D

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Netherlands	10	9	1	0	34	5	+29	28
Romania	10	6	1	3	19	12	+7	19
Hungary	10	5	2	3	21	20	+1	17
Turkey	10	5	1	4	16	9	+7	16
Estonia	10	2	1	7	6	20	−14	7
Andorra	10	0	0	10	0	30	−30	0

As is come to be expected now, The Netherlands were very strong in qualifying with a draw against Estonia, the only blip amongst results such as a 8-1 over Hungary. This stalemate was a very unusual result considering Estonia finished 5th in the group, but were able to get a draw against The Netherlands in which a stoppage time Robin van Persie penalty was needed to rescue a point. As you may have guessed, The Netherlands secured their spot at the finals prior to the final two matches. A play-off spot will be well received by Romanian fans, as the team may not have been favourites to finish as high as they did, despite Turkey and Hungary being weaker than former iterations of their teams. Overall, this was a generally weaker group that made life easy for The Netherlands, and time will tell if Romania can put in two more good performances and get to Brazil. 

Group E

Team v	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Switzerland	10	7	3	0	17	6	+11	24
Iceland	10	5	2	3	17	15	+2	17
Slovenia	10	5	0	5	14	11	+3	15
Norway	10	3	3	4	10	13	−3	12
Albania	10	3	2	5	9	11	−2	11
Cyprus	10	1	2	7	4	15	−11	5

Switzerland came out on top in one of if not the weakest group in qualifying, despite this, my definite story of the campaign is the success of Iceland. A draw over Scandinavian rivals Norway, along with Switzerland's win over Slovenia on Tuesday meant that the island nation with a population of just over 300,000 have a shot at qualification for their first ever major tournament, and be the smallest nation to ever qualify. Cardiff midfielder; Aron Gunnarson, said that "It will be the most important game we have ever played". The situation is even greater when the fact that they were ranked in the bottom pot for qualification, alongside the likes of San Marino, and Andorra is taken into consideration, and that they were the only team to lose to bottom of the table Cyprus. Gaining this at Norway's expense makes the success even sweeter for the Icelanders, who finally have something to smile about. They had already beaten them at home earlier on in the campaign. Slovenia, Norway, and maybe even Albania, may be disappointed that they may have under performed and allowed the bottom seed take the play-off spot, considering this may be the weakest teams/best chance they have to play against/qualify for some time. Iceland have been ranked as one of the lower seeds for the play-offs

Group F

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Russia	10	7	1	2	20	5	+15	22
Portugal	10	6	3	1	20	9	+11	21
Israel	10	3	5	2	19	14	+5	14
Azerbaijan	10	1	6	3	7	11	−4	9
Northern Ireland	10	1	4	5	9	17	−8	7
Luxembourg	10	1	3	6	7	26	−19	6

Group E was a shoot out between Portugal and Russia for the automatic spot, in which Fabio Capello's Russian team came out on top to reach their first finals since 2002. Russia gained the point they needed on Tuesday with a draw against Azerbaijan, who recorded their first World Cup qualifying win for many years against Northern Ireland days before. Portugal have to settle for a play-off, similarly to the last Euro qualifiers, although they will definitely be one of many peoples favourites to be on their way to Brazil. They have been seeded into the first pot for the play-offs. A very disappointing qualifying campaign was had for Northern Ireland, including defeats to Azerbaijan, and an embarrassing away loss to Luxembourg 3-2, who had a decent campaign. As you can see, nobody really came close to the top 2, with 3rd place Israel 7 points adrift. 

Group G

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Bosnia and Herzegovina	10	8	1	1	30	6	+24	25
Greece	10	8	1	1	12	4	+8	25
Slovakia	10	3	4	3	11	10	+1	13
Lithuania	10	3	2	5	9	11	−2	11
Latvia	10	2	2	6	10	20	−10	8
Liechtenstein	10	0	2	8	4	25	−21	2

Another group on the weak side paved way for Bosnia and Herzegovina to qualify for their first ever World Cup Finals as an independent nation. The team, headed players such as, Edin Dzeko, Asmir Begovic, and Miralem Pjanic, gained the 3 points they needed in a close fought 1-0 away win over Lithuania on Tuesday. Greece narrowly missed out on automatic qualification to their second successive World Cup, with a largely inferior goal difference to Bosnia. Other than that, the gulf was even larger than in group E, with 12 points separating Greece with 3rd placed Slovakia. Slovakia, who qualified for World Cup 2010, will be disappointed with how far short they came against teams of round about their standard. 2 points is a relative success for the Liechtensteiners. 


Group H

Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts  England 10 6 4 0 31 4 +27 22  Ukraine 10 6 3 1 28 4 +24 21  Montenegro 10 4 3 3 18 17 +1 15  Poland 10 3 4 3 18 12 +6 13  Moldova 10 3 2 5 12 17 −5 11  San Marino 10 0 0 10 1 54 −53 0

Tuesday night's exciting game against Poland ended England's fears of qualification failure, as Ukraine's 8-0 victory over San Marino on Tuesday wasn't enough for qualification. Wayne Rooney opened the scoring just before halftime, with Steven Gerrard sealing qualification minutes from the end. Poland's coach Waldemar Fornalik was sacked afterwards, as the game signalled the end of a disappointing campaign, in which the team, with players such as Robert Lewandowski at their disposal failed to qualify. Montenegro have come close many times now since their independence as a nation, and I'm sure they will qualify for a major tournament eventually. Their campaign ended with a shock 5-2 home defeat to Moldova on Tuesday. Ukraine will be one of the favourites to reach their second ever World Cup after they made their debut in 2006. Earlier this month, Ukraine put nine past San Marino 

Group I

Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts  Spain 8 6 2 0 14 3 +11 20  France 8 5 2 1 15 6 +9 17  Finland 8 2 3 3 5 9 −4 9  Georgia 8 1 2 5 3 10 −7 5  Belarus 8 1 1 6 7 16 −9 4

The now customary small group was a seemingly strong one with giants Spain, and very strong France contesting the top two spots. As everybody would have imagined the World champions came out on top, with 1-1 home draws against France, and in a shock result, Finland, being the only mishaps. In a way I feel for France, who would have favoured themselves to come out on top in groups such as F and G. Furthermore, their current World Ranking means that they will be one of the four lower seeds for the play-offs, with a potential France vs Portugal fixture meaning a strong team could miss out. France are ranked one place lower than Ukraine, a place which would have moved them into the top four seeds. Despite winning quite comfortably, Spain never ran away with any games, with the other three teams in the group pulling off some better than expected results, without however challenging the top two for position in the group. 

To reiterate; the nine teams that have gained automatic qualification for next year are as follows:

Group A	Group B	Group C	Group D	Group E	Group F	Group G	Group H	Group I
Belgium	Italy	Germany	Netherlands	Switzerland	Russia	Bosnia and Herzegovina	England	Spain

The runners-up of each group, with play-off spot earners in blue are as follows:

Grp	Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
G	Greece	8	6	1	1	9	4	+5	19
I	France	8	5	2	1	15	6	+9	17
F	Portugal	8	4	3	1	15	8	+7	15
H	Ukraine	8	4	3	1	11	4	+7	15
C	Sweden	8	4	2	2	15	13	+2	14
E	Iceland	8	4	2	2	15	14	+1	14
D	Romania	8	4	1	3	11	12	−1	13
A	Croatia	8	3	2	3	9	8	+1	11
B	Denmark	8	2	4	2	9	11	−2	10

Due to the final group having one less team than the others, any points scored against the bottom placed team in these group are discounted, only then is the worst runner-up (Denmark), eliminated. It is important to note however that this order does not determine the four teams in pot 1 and 2 for the draw, this is determined by each nation's FIFA World Ranking. The allocation of the eight teams into two pots is as follows, with each team's respective World Ranking in brackets:

Pot 1	Pot 2
Portugal (14)  Greece (15)  Croatia (18)  Ukraine (20)	France (21)  Sweden (25)  Romania (29)  Iceland (46)

The draw for these matches will take place in Zürich, on the 21st of October, with the first and second legs of each fixture taking place on the 15th and 19th of November respectively. The four winners of the matches will qualify for the World Cup next year in Brazil, and make up the final members of Europe's 13 team contingent. 

Qualifying in Pictures