The draw has concluded and the groups have been decided. It is definitely going to be a group stage worth watching as Die Mannschaft (Germany), La Furia Roja ( Spain) and England have been placed in the same group stage alongside Finland. Group A is also quite exciting as Italy have been drawn alongside Serbia, Belarus and Sweden. Sweden will be hosting the tournament in June 2009.
Format: There are ten groups. Ten group winners emerge from the groups and four best runners-up are chosen. A draw determines who plays who in the playoffs. The seven winners are then joined by the hosts, in this case, Sweden for the final tournament and divided into two groups.
Group A
Sweden
Sweden don’t have Johan Elmander to score goals for them any more, but they have Marcus Berg. They made it to the semis in 2004 but at the moment, seem like an outside bet to win the Euros. They lost five matches out of the eight they played in 2007 but they lost only twice last year. Due to being the hosts, they may have a chance to reach the semis again. They will come face to face with Serbia who knocked them out of the competition in Germany in 2004.
Belarus
Belarus have done extremely well in qualifying with only one defeat which came against the Serbs. There is no Alexsandr Hleb this time, but there is BATE Borisov’s midfielder Sergei Kryvets. They aren’t exactly an outside bet to win, but will have to overcome the Italians and Serbs to reach the semis.
Serbia
In Gojko Kacar, Serbia has a defensive midfielder who can score five times in one match. In the 8-0 rout of Hungary, that’s exactly what the Hertha Berlin man did. It was heartbreak for the Danish as Serbia beat them in the playoffs for a place in the final tournament. A 2-0 aggregate win over the Danes was enough to see the Serbs book a trip to Sweden.
Italy
Italy have the habit of grinding out wins and they did just that in qualifying. Unconvincing victories over teams like the Faroe Islands and a draw against Greece was followed by the demolition of possibly the weakest side in their group, Azerbaijan, 5-0. In the play offs, they met Israel. With an aggregate score of 3-1 in their favour, Italy went through to the final tournament.
Group B
Germany
Germany have Marko Marin, Mezut Ozil, Toni Kroos, Rouwen Hennings, Sebastian Boenisch, who else do they need? However everything wasn’t easy for Germany. They drew twice with Israel and would have lost had it not been for Henning’s late strike. A couple of one-sided victories against Luxembourg and Northern Ireland helped them to qualify.
A very late strike from Howedes Benedikt allowed them to go through at France’s expensive in the playoffs with an aggregate score of 2-1. Coach Dieter Eilts lost his position and was succeeded by Horst Hrubesch due to poor results in qualifying. A team with the likes of Sami Khedira, Eugen Polanski, Manuel Neuer and Mats Hummels is expected to go far in the tournament though.
Spain
9 Comments
Loading more comments...
This comment and all replies have been deleted This comment has been deleted Undo delete