Nov
14
France, Portugal and Russia take first step towards South Africa’s 2010 World Cup
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Today was held the first leg of the European playoffs for the 4 spots remaining for the 2010 FIFA World Cup. Three of the four matches ended in a victory for one of the contestants while the fourth between Greece and Ukraine ended in a 0-0 tie.
The winners of the matches today were Portugal, France,and Russia or in theory the strongest teams from the two groups. The losers were Ireland, Slovenia, and Bosnia. Don’t think though that any of the winning teams had an easy time.
Portugal won their game with an early goal by Alves but were lucky not to concede any as the Bosnian team hit the post twice and the cross-bar once. Portugal had the control for most of the game but without Ronaldo leading their attacks were hopeless upfront.
Russia were practically packing for their trip to South Africa after scoring 2 goals early in the second half of their match against Slovenia at home. But the Slovenian team did not give up and with only 3 minutes remaining in the game they scored what could become a golden goal for them. The final 2-1 result gives them some hope for going to the World Cup since they only need a 1-0 win at home next Wednesday to qualify.
France can consider themeselves lucky and through to the finals after escaping from Dublin with a 0-1 victory over a much better Irish team. Scorer of the golden goal for France was Nicolas Anelka at the 72nd minute of the game. Ireland was the better team on the night but it was not meant to be. I expect the next game to be as exciting as the one today.
Finally, Greece failed to capitalize on home advantage in their first game against Ukraine. The 2004 European Champions played defensively focusing mostly on not conceding a goal. They created few goal scoring chances although they are right to complain when the referee disallowed a goal as offside early in the first half; it is clear from the replay that none of the players were in an offside position and the goal should have counted. Ukraine showed the offensive prowess but failed to put a ball past the Greek goalkeeper. Wednesday’s match in frozen Ukraine should be a cracker.