Other Euro qualifiers

1

Group A:

Excellent wins for both Portugal (4-0 home to Belgium) and Poland (5-0 home to Azerbaijan) especially with Serbia losing away to Kazakhstan. Quaresma got a superb goal for Portugal:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRE2kpPlkeI

Always liked him as a player, when he’s on form he’s sensational.

1 Poland 6 4 1 1 11 5 6 13
2 Finland 5 3 2 0 7 2 5 11
3 Portugal 5 3 1 1 12 3 9 10
4 Serbia 5 3 1 1 7 3 4 10
5 Belgium 6 2 1 3 4 6 -2 7
6 Kazakhstan 6 1 2 3 3 8 -5 5
7 Armenia 4 0 1 3 0 5 -5 1
8 Azerbaijan 5 0 1 4 1 13 -12 1

Group B:

France won away 1-0 at Lithuania after Scotland scraped a home win against Georgia (the Beat got the last minute goal with a scuffed finish). Ukraine won away in the Faroe Islands. That was a really tough draw for Scotland with France, Ukraine and Italy but they’re doing very well.

1 Scotland 5 4 0 1 11 4 7 12
2 France 5 4 0 1 12 2 10 12
3 Ukraine 4 3 0 1 7 4 3 9
4 Italy 4 2 1 1 7 5 2 7
5 Lithuania 4 1 1 2 3 4 -1 4
6 Georgia 5 1 0 4 10 11 -1 3
7 Faroe Islands 5 0 0 5 0 20 -20 0

Group C:

Turkey won 4-1 away to Greece which is a superb result, a lot of political tension around that game as well. Bosnia won 2-1 in Norway with a cracking free kick from Misimovic to open the scoring:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dc1ClrqUOL0

That game was stopped for a while because the Bosnian fans were protesting against their football association by throwing flares on the pitch in Oslo. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5G8SZ8Cr0xI)

1 Turkey 4 4 0 0 12 1 11 12
2 Greece 4 3 0 1 7 4 3 9
3 Bosnia-H 5 2 1 2 10 12 -2 7
4 Norway 4 2 0 2 7 4 3 6
5 Malta 4 1 1 2 5 9 -4 4
6 Hungary 4 1 0 3 5 8 -3 3
7 Moldova 5 0 2 3 3 11 -8 2

Group D:

Germany might have done us a favour by beating the Czechs in Prague, in all likelihood they probably did Slovakia a favour though, given our current incompetence. Kuranyi got both goals for Germany with Petr Cech very suspect on the first one (super header though):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QFAXF3KqV_E

Slovakia won 3-1 in Cyprus, they were one down. Vittek got their first goal - he’ll be the danger man on Wednesday.

As we know Ireland beat Wales in a thriller.

1 Germany 5 4 1 0 21 3 18 13
2 Czech Republi 5 3 1 1 14 4 10 10
3 Rep of Irelan 6 3 1 2 11 8 3 10
4 Slovakia 5 3 0 2 15 10 5 9
5 Cyprus 5 1 1 3 9 15 -6 4
6 Wales 4 1 0 3 5 9 -4 3
7 San Marino 4 0 0 4 1 27 -26 0

Group E:

England are in a small bit of trouble now after drawing away to Israel while both Croatia and Russia winning. Croatia came from behind to beat Macedonia with Da Silva getting the winner (recommended by both myself and Bandage as a quality signing [url=http://www.thefreekick.com/index.php?option=com_smf&Itemid=37&topic=520.0]here). The Sky boys were commenting on how the Israel point “might not be a bad result for England because Croatia are currently losing as we understand”, so great to see them turn it round and get the 3 points.

1 Croatia 5 4 1 0 15 4 11 13
2 Russia 5 3 2 0 7 1 6 11
3 England 5 2 2 1 6 2 4 8
4 Israel 5 2 2 1 9 6 3 8
5 FYR Mac 6 2 1 3 5 5 0 7
6 Estonia 4 0 0 4 0 6 -6 0
7 Andorra 4 0 0 4 1 19 -18 0

Group F:

Spain won 2-1 at home to Denmark with the occupied 6 winning 4-1 in Liechtenstein (Healy got a hat tick). Leaves Sweden in a great position to qualiffy with 5 points over Denmark and 6 over Spain.

1 Sweden 4 4 0 0 8 2 6 12
2 N Ireland 5 3 1 1 8 6 2 10
3 Denmark 4 2 1 1 7 2 5 7
4 Spain 4 2 0 2 8 6 2 6
5 Latvia 3 1 0 2 4 2 2 3
6 Iceland 4 1 0 3 4 8 -4 3
7 Liechtens 4 0 0 4 2 15 -13 0

Group G:

No goals in Holland v Romania (didn’t look to be many chances either from what I saw). Belarus won in Luxembourg and Albania and Slovenia was no score too.

1 Holland 5 3 2 0 7 2 5 11
2 Bulgaria 4 2 2 0 7 3 4 8
3 Romania 4 2 2 0 7 3 4 8
4 Belarus 5 2 1 2 9 11 -2 7
5 Slovenia 4 1 1 2 4 7 -3 4
6 Albania 4 0 2 2 3 6 -3 2
7 Luxembourg 4 0 0 4 1 6 -5 0

2

That’s some goal by Quaresma. What skill.

Watched the Germany-Czech game and initially we thought a draw would be best for our (purely theoretical) chances of qualifying. But then I changed my mind and concluded that one team running away with it and beating the other teams will give us a chance to be in with a shout for 2nd. Germany thoroughly dominated the whole game and deserved to win by 3 or 4 goals. Kuranyi is interesting - since I saw him play for Stuttgart against Celtic in the Seville season I always thought he was a superb player. I remember him destroying ManU the following season in the CL in the team with Lahm and Hleb and thought he’d go to Bayern or one of the big Spanish or Italian sides. Was very surprised he went to Schalke and he was even omitted from the World Cup squad last summer but this season he’s on course to win the title with them. His second header was excellent too.

England are in real trouble. All it needs is for them to shit themselves at home to either Russia or Croatia and they might be gone.

3

that quaresma goal was class, who does he play for? that group is looking very interesting, shocking result for Serbia

4

Quaresma plays for Porto. He was a youngster at Sporting and Barcelona bought him about 3 years ago. He actually started the season on fire for them if I remember properly but then lost his spot and spent the rest of the year on the bench. Then Barca swapped him for Deco (probably money involved) and he went back to Portugal. He’s scored loads of goals like that - he uses the outside of the right boot all the time.

Cracking video of him here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFmYhZW63qI

5

What a goal from Quaresma that was. Best strike I have seen since John Collins’ freekick against the Huns about 15 years ago.

6

Like the reference to England here, from The Guardian:

NORN IRON BREW

Guam, Aruba, Sao Tome and Montserrat. Types of cheese? Swahili swear
words? New Bolton signings? No, they’re four of the nine countries
currently doing something cheek-wrenchingly rude to the Fifa world
ranking: sharing its bottom. If that sounds anatomically improbable,
then the next bit is freaking incredible: none of the other countries
on the list are called Northern Ireland. “What manager Lawrie Sanchez
has done is no mean feat,” gasped Sweden supremo Lars Lagerback today
upon realising that the team his side face in a Euro 2008 tryst
tomorrow are not the dungpile of yesteryear.

Not by a long shot. When Sanchez took over in 2004, Northern Ireland
were ranked 124th on the planet, had gone 14 matches without a win
and a world-record 10 games without an international goal, a wretched
run that, along with Patrick Kielty, solidified the province’s
reputation as a land where comedians are face-punchingly unfunny and
footballers slapstick hilarious. Subsequent wins over fellow
no-hopers Estonia and England did little to alter that perception,
especially as normal awful service resumed as they marked the
beginning of their Euro 2008 campaign with a 3-0 home shellacking by
Iceland.

But since then Sanchez’s side have embarked on the hottest streak
since Lady Godiva - including wins over Spain, Latvia and
Liechtenstein and a draw against Denmark - all of which means that if
they shock Sweden tomorrow, they’ll leapfrog them to the top of Group
F and become, if David Icke is to be believed, one of the few
European leaders not to be a reptilian extra-terrestrial hellbent on
enslaving humanity.

Having said that, if they do win, their goal(s) will likely be scored
by the suspiciously out-of-this-world David Healy, who’s hit seven in
his last four internationals to become the joint top scorer in the
tournament alongside Lukas Podolski. “He seems to pop up wherever
there’s a sniff of a chance,” marvelled Lagerback before ending this
story with a suitable anti-climax: “But he’s not that quick and our
defenders should be able to handle him.”

7

Liechtenstein have beaten Latvia 1-0 at home.

8

Zurawski’s goal for Poland in 1-0 win over Armenia.

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9

Seemed to be a cracking atmosphere at that game

10

When he scores goals like that you want him to stay at Celtic.

I won’t be sad if he goes though.

11

He’s our second best striker at the moment - I’ve no doubt of that. He had a run of bad form for a while but even against the likes of Benfica at home when he was in a bit of a slump he put in a hell of a shift covering Naka’s man and I think we missed that in the away leg because their full backs destroyed us.

If I could keep one of Miller, The Beat or Magic it would be Magic despite his age. He scores goals.

12

Check out the goals Thomas Myhre lets in for Norway last night. Some funny.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iwNYc9hNJyQ