Someone at FIFA has a sense of humor. Why else would England and Croatia be paired in the same World Cup qualifying group less than a week after Croatia showed England the door from Euro 2008?
The European groups are pretty bland to be honest. Group 1 is a killer with Portugal, Sweden and Denmark clawing for one automatic berth. But the remaining eight have a pretty clear-cut winner (I'm not making predictions today, but you can figure it out yourself).
The nine group winners qualify for South Africa, and the eight runners-up with the best records will go in to four playoff matchups, knockout style, to produce four more finalists, 13 in all from Europe.
Going group by group:
- Portugal, Sweden, Denmark, Hungary, Albania and Malta.
- Greece, Israel, Switzerland, Moldova, Latvia, Luxembourg
- Czech Republic, Poland, Northern Ireland, Slovakia, Slovenia, San Marino
- Germany, Russia, Finland, Wales, Azerbaijan, Liechtenstein
- Spain, Turkey, Belgium, Bosnia, Armenia, Estonia
- Croatia, England, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Andorra
- France, Romania, Serbia, Lithuania, Austria, Faroe Islands
- Italy, Bulgaria, Ireland, Cyprus, Georgia, Montenegro
- Netherlands, Scotland, Norway, Macedonia, Iceland
If you’re looking for analysis of the UEFA groups, try:
Soccer by Ives
Reuters
Euro Football Highlights blogRoad to 2010 Final blog
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