Qualifications for the World Cup 2010

Nine more free places for South Africa

Along with the host country 22 more national teams have qualified for the World Cup. There are free places left for four European, three African and two national teams from other continents. The final draw for WC 2010 will be held in Cape Town on December 4


By RADOMIR ĐUROVIĆ (radomir.djurovic@wavemagazine.net)
from Belgrade, SERBIA
Translation: MILENA OTAŠEVIĆ


The names of 23 participants of the World Cup which will be held next summer in South Africa are already known. Along with the host's national team the teams qualified for the 19th World Cup, to be held on the "Black continent" for the first time, include: Denmark, Switzerland, Slovakia, Germany, Spain, England, Serbia, Italy, Netherlands (Europe); Mexico, USA, Honduras (North and Central America and the Caribbean); Brazil, Chile, Paraguay, Argentina (South America); Australia, Japan, North Korea, South Korea (Asia); Ghana and Côte d'Ivoire (Africa). There are 9 more free places and they will be filled by four winners of European play-offs, three teams from Africa and two winners of intercontinental qualifications.

European play-off will be extremely interesting and the matches (on Nov 14 and Nov 18) are between: Ireland - France, Portugal - Bosnia and Herzegovina, Greece - Ukraine and Russia - Slovenia. Although the national team of Bosnia and Herzegovina was in the group with the last year's European championship semi-finalists, Spain and Turkey, they played great and accomplished the greatest success since it started competing as an independent state. They are lead by an experienced coach Miroslav Blažević who won a bronze medal on World Cup in France in 1998 leading the national team of Croatia.

- Portugal is a favorite to win in this match, but it isn't always the favorite that wins. Portugal has a lot of great individual players but I think we have the quality to eliminate them from the competition. They will have a hard time when they come to Zenica - said Blažević.

European matches

The coach of the national team of Portugal, Carlos Cerios believes that in matches like this one there are no favourites and that they will have to put in a lot of effort in order to qualify for WC in South Africa. The outcome of the match between Greece and Ukraine is considered to be the most uncertain. The Ukrainians were ecstatic when they saw who their opponent in the play-offs is going to be and they believe they can qualify for the WC second time in a row (first time in 1994).

Slovenia was in the group with the Czech Republic and Poland but they managed to get to the 2nd place and (they too) will have an opportunity to qualify for the World Cup for the second time. It was exactly through the play-offs that they managed to qualify for the World Cup in 2002 in Japan and South Korea, when they proved to be better than Romania. Now, they will have Russia as an opponent whose last World Cup participation was in 2002 too. Russian team is the favourite but in the last matches of the qualifications the Slovenians have shown that they have pretty high aspirations.

After playing tie two times with the World Champion Italy, Ireland is facing matches with the second best team in the world - France. Optimism is present on both sides. The Irish believe they can beat the French who lately haven't been playing as it has been expected from them. The technical director of the French National Team, Gerard Houllier thinks that their advantage is that the return match is going to be played in Paris.

Intercontinental play-offs

The most interesting match of the intercontinental play-offs will be played between the representative of Central and South America - Costa Rica and Uruguay. The Costa Rican team has missed qualifying directly for South Africa by an inch after receiving a goal from the USA. The twice world champion Uruguay is participating in the play-offs for the third time in a row. The first two times were against Australia and Uruguay had partial success. These games are scheduled to be played the same time as European play-offs.

Bahrain is for the second time one step away from the World Cup. Four years ago they lost to Trinidad and Tobago in the play-offs and now New Zealand is standing on their way to South Africa. The first game has already been played in Bahrain and there were no goals, the same as in the Asian play-off against Saudi Arabia when they played 0-0 on home field but the score in the return match was 2-2. If New Zealanders prove to be better that will be their second participation in World Cups (first was in 1982 in Spain). The return match will be played on 14th of November.

The last round of African qualifications still remains to be played. Two winners are known and six teams are competing for the remaining three places. The most interesting situation is in group C where the Champion of Africa - Egypt is playing against Alger. In the remaining groups the candidates for the World Cup are Cameroon and Gabon (group A) and Tunisia and Nigeria (group B). The last round in Africa will be played on 14th of November.

The final draw of groups on the World Cup will be held on 4th of December in Cape Town.


(Published: 11.11.2009.)