Category Archives: Football

Gunners mowed down by Bayern

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Champions League 2015-16: Arsenal went into round four with great confidence, having defeated Bayern Munich home at Emirates Stadium. Three important points after having losing the first two matches against Olympiakos and Dinamo Zagreb. However, Bayern brought their largest guns this time and the gunners were mowed down over 90 minutes.

“Femetta”

In Sweden we have a saying from the Speedway motorcycle sport: A femetta. That pretty much is a substantive meaning a 5-1 victory. It can also be interpreted as a superior victory. This was exactly what happened at Allianz Arena this night.

The match started in a great pace. Arsenal could keep up in about 8 minutes. In the 10th minute, Robert Lewanodowski scored 1-0 through a header. Bayern stepped on it. They were in complete control of the game. Thomas Müller rolled in 2-0 in the 29th minute. David Alaba scored 3-0 with a beautiful shot in the 44th minute. 10-0 in scoring chances in favor of Bayern said the most about the first half.

Kingsley Coman, born 1996, French football player that went from Paris SG to Juventus last season. He is now playing on loan for Bayern Munich for two years and made a good overall match against Arsenal. In the second half he was substituted by 12 years older Arjen Robben who scored after being on the field for just 30 seconds.

At 4-0 Bayern slowed down the pace a bit. Arsenal almost managed to score in the 57th minute, but Manual Neuer made an excellent save. About 10 minutes later he had to resign a goal though. Olivier Giroud scored on an excellent individual performance. 4-1 and a part of the Gunner’s self-esteem was saved. However, in the 89th minute, Müller scored his second goal of the night, putting the nail in the coffin, 5-1.

This was the 5th time this year that Bayern score 5 goals in a game. They are in a superior lead in Bundesliga and will probably go far in the Champions League this year. Arsenal has to rely on other results if they are to go through to the play offs. They are placed last in the group with 3 points. Their best bet is to hope for Bayern to beat Olympiakos at home and then defeat them away December 9.

Other results:

Barcelona 3 – 0 BATE Borisov
Chelsea 2 – 1 Dynamo Kiev
AA Gent (Bel) 1 – 0 Valencia
Lyon 0 – 2 Zenit St. Petersburg
Maccabi Tel Aviv 1 – 3 FC Porto
Olympiakos FC 2 – 1 Dinamo Zagreb
Roma 3 – 2 Bayer Leverkusen
Astana 0 – 0 Atletico Madrid
Benfica 2 – 1 Galatasaray
Borussia Monchengladbach 1 – 1 Juventus
Manchester United 1 – 0 CSKA Moscow
PSV Eindhoven 2 – 0 Wolfsburg
Real Madrid 1 – 0 Paris St Germain
Sevilla 1 – 3 Manchester City
Shakhtar Donetsk 4 – 0 Malmö FF

Next round:

In the next round, we have the following fixtures:

Tuesday, November 24:

BATE Bor – Bayer Levkn
Barcelona – Roma
Arsenal – Dinamo Zagreb
Bayern Mun – Olympiakos
FC Porto – Dynamo Kiev
M’bi Tel-Aviv – Chelsea
Zenit St P – Valencia
Lyon – KAA Gent

Wednesday, November 25:

Malmö FF – Paris St G
Shakt Donsk – Real Madrid
CSKA – VfL Wolfsburg
Man Utd – PSV Eindhoven

State of Euro football, November 2015

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Fotbolls-EM

It’s been a month since we looked at the standings in the European football leagues. In this post we will look at the top teams of Europe’s biggest football nations: German Bundesliga, Spanish La Liga, French Ligue 1, English Premier League and Italy’s serie A.

Bundesliga

Nothing new here. Bayern Munich are still at the top with 11 victories and 1 draw. Dortmund is 5 points behind. At spot 3 and 4 we find Wolfsburg and Schalke at 21 and 20 points. Unless something totally unexpected happens, Bayern will win the Bundesliga this season as well. However, the fans require that they also advances in the Champions League. They are playing Arsenal on November 3rd.

La Liga

A month ago, both Barcelona and Real Madrid were struggling in the Spanish football league. However, now they are at the top at 24 points each. Maybe it will take an El Clásico to separate the two teams? The next El Clásico is played Saturday, November 21. Celta Vigo is third at 21 points and Atlético Madrid 4th at 20 points.

Ligue 1

Nothing to see here folks. Paris SG is still at the top, as expected. The fans require them to win every title in France, but the question is how they will do in Champions League? They played a goalless tie against Real Madrid last round. Lyon, Angers and St Etienne are all at 22 points, 10 points behind PSG.

Premier League

In Premier League, Chelsea keeps disappointing and the question is not if, but when Jose Mourinho will get fired. In the last match against Liverpool, Chelsea got the early go ahead goal, but in the end of the day they lost by 1-3. At the top of the league we find Manchester City and Arsenal, both at 25 points. Leicester is at third place at 22 points, 1 point before Manchester United. I guess we could some this up so far by stating that Chelsea and Leicester is the biggest surprises so far.

Serie A

This is perhaps the most even league among the big five. Fiorentina and Inter are at the top with 24 points each. Roma is chasing behind at 23 points and Napoli at 22 points. Last season’s champions Juventus are struggling at 10th place.

We will be back in December with another report from the best football leagues of Europe. However, before then we will focus on Champions League and the Euro 2016 play off qualifiers.

Rosenberg’s goal gave Malmö their first Champions League victory 2015-16

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champions league

After two straight losses, against Paris SG and Real Madrid, Malmö FF finally got the victory they needed in the 2015-16 Champions League. Against visiting Shakthar Donetsk, Markus Rosenberg scored the first goal in the 17th minute. That can be an important milestone in Malmö’s European adventure: the third placed team in the group will go through to play in the Europa Lague.

Markus Rosenberg scored 1-0

Shakthar had most of the ball possession (about 2/3 the entire game). However, Malmö played with high pressure. This disarmed the Ukrainian midfield and they had to rely on long passes which made them look uncomfortable. In the 17th minute of the first half, Pa Konate reached Markus Rosenberg with a brilliant pass. Rosenberg made no mistake when he put the ball in the net behind Andrij Pyatov. After the goal, Malmö fell back in their positions for a while and Shakhtar could move their game up field. However, this gave Malmö some excellent chances for 3 against 3 rushes and similar break-outs. However, no more goals were scored in the first half.

In the other half, Malmö were close to increasing their lead. Still, Shakhtar had the possession but Malmö got the better chances to score. In the 55th minute they were awarded a penalty after 33-year old Croatian defender Darijo Srna had interfered Jo Inge Berget in the penalty area. Srna had a tough night, with a head injury in the first half, the penalty and some other referee decisions against him. However, Andreij Pyatov made a nice save on the penalty kick, keeping Malmö’s lead down to one goal.

Malmö had a good night. Many players delivered their best all over the field: Po Konate, who assisted on the first goal, was excellent. Johan Aronsson made a solid defensive match. Erdal Rakip gave the team new energy in the second half with his two-way plays and offensive runs. Three points were well deserved and the score could have been both 2- and 3-0, but the match ended 1-0.

The result means that Malmö is placed third in group A. The next match is a return against Shakhtar Donetsk. Because of the unrest in Ukraine, Shakhtar will play their home matches at Arena Lviv, which was also used in the 2012 European Championships. The game will be an important decider of the third place if we rule out that neither Shakhtar or Malmö will get any points against Real Madrid and Paris SG (who played 0-0 in Paris this round).

Standings after Champions League’s third round

PSG is at the top of group A after the tie against Real Madrid

Wolfsburg is at the top of group B before Manchester United. The Germans defeated PSV Eindhoven while Man U got a tie away against CSKA Moscow

Atlético Madrid crushed FC Astana 4-0 while Galatasaray defeated Benfica 2-1. Atlético is in the top of group C before Benfica. Galatasaray is trailing 2 points behind.

Juventus and Manchester City got one home win each and is placed one and two in group D, as expected.

Last year’s champions, Barcelona, defeated FC Bate Borisov away and is at the top of group E at 7 points. Bayer Leverkusen played a tied goal fiesta against Roma, 4-4, and is placed second in the group.

Arsenal got a heavyweight victory at home, defeating Bayern Munich 2-0. However, they are only placed third in group F where Bayern is in the lead before Olympiacos.

Chelsea only got a goalless tie against Dynamo Kiev and are now placed third in group G. They are also struggling in Premier League. Porto is in the lead after defeating Maccabi Tel-Aviv.

In group H, Valencia and Zenit got a home victory each. FC Zenit is undefeated at the top of the group before Valencia.

Euro 2016 play off qualifiers

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UEFA

In an earlier post we listed the 20 countries that have qualified for the 2016 UEFA European Championships. However, there are still four places to be filled. Eight teams will play two matches each. The winners will clinch a spot in the tournament. Below are fixtures and match dates:

Norway v Hungary: 12th and 15th November

Bosnia and Herzegovina v Republic of Ireland: 13th & 16th November

Ukraine v Slovenia: 14th & 17th November

Sweden v Denmark: 14th & 17th November

According to UEFA, the highlight of the playoffs is the match between nordic rivals Sweden and Denmark. We agree!

Sweden versus Denmark statistics

  • Sweden and Denmark have faced each other 104 times. Sweden has 45 wins and Denmark 40. However, Denmark has won the last four matches against Sweden.
  • When Denmark won the 1992 European Championships (in Sweden), they got a spot in the tournament thanks to former republic of Yugoslavia being disqualified because of the civil war. Then, Sweden were the only team that managed to beat Denmark.
  • The last match that Sweden won was an odd one: In the qualifiers for the 2008 European Championships, the teams met in Copenhagen. Sweden went ahead by 3-0, but Denmark tied the game 3-3 in the second half. At the end of the game, the referee was assaulted by a drunken fan when he awarded a penalty kick to Sweden. This caused the game to be decided a Swedish 3-0 win. Sweden then qualified for the Euro 2008.
  • Denmark is ranked 28 and Sweden 45 by FIFA (October).
  • Sweden’s staring lineup is worth approximately 450 million SEK (48 million EURO) and Denmark’s 600 million SEK (64 million EURO).
  • In the U21 European Championships this summer, Sweden won the gold. The Swedish U21-team defeated Denmark in the semifinal.
  • In the qualifiers, Denmark scored 8 goals in 10 games. Sweden scored 15. Denmark only let in 5 goals though, and Sweden 9.
  • Sweden has Zlatan Ibrahimovic 🙂

20 countries ready for EURO 2016

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UEFA

The last round of the qualifiers to the UEFA European Championships 2016 has been played and after a lot of drama, 20 countries are now ready to play in the tournament. They will be accompanied by an 4 additional teams after the playoffs have been decided.

Qualified countries

France (host country), Iceland, Czech Republic, England, Austria, Northern Ireland, Portugal, Spain, Switzerland, Italy, Belgium, Wales, Albania, Romania, Germany, Poland, Russia, Turkey, Croatia, Slovakia.

Se comments under final standings below.

Play offs (seeded | unseeded)

Ukraine, Bosnia & Herzegovina, Sweden, Hungary | Denmark, Ireland, Norway, Slovenia.

The seeded teams will be drawn against the unseeded teams Sunday, October 18th. Each pair of teams will face each other two times, home and away. The first play off matches are played 12-14 November and the second three days later. The four winning teams will get a spot in the European Championships 2016.

Final standings

The first and second placed teams are directly qualified to the UEFA European Championships in France 2016, together with the best third placed team. The remaining third placed teams will play for a place in the tournament through play offs.

Group A

Czech Republic 22p
Iceland 20p
Turkey 18p
—
Netherlands 13p
Kazakhstan 5p
Latvia 5p

Comment: By far the most surprising results of the qualifiers. Who could have guessed that Iceland would clinch a spot in the EURO 2016 beforehand? And what a catastrophe for Netherlands, who won bronze in the 2014 World Cup. Turkey clinched a place in the tournament as the best third placed team.

Group B

Belgium 23p
Wales 21p
Bosnia & Herzegovina 17p
—
Israel 13p
Cyprus 12p
Andorra 0p

Comment: Belgium and Wales have placed themself on the top of FIFA’s world ranking during the qualifiers. This has been a tough group. At Chicken Swedes we have placed a few bets against Cyprus this season, and lost..

Group C

Spain 27p
Slovakia 22p
Ukraine 19p
—
Belarus 11p
Luxembourg 4p
Macedonia 4p

Comment: This group turned out pretty much as expected, with Spain at the top. Slovakia has done a solid performance throughout the qualifiers.

Group D

Germany 22p
Poland 21p
Republic of Ireland 18p
—
Scotland 15p
Georgia 9p
Gibraltar 0p

Comment: FIFA World Cup 2014 winners Germany at the top, as expected. However, they weren’t dominating the group: A 7-1-2 record tells us that there has been some fierce battles and Polish resistance in group D.

Group E

England 30p
Switzerland 21p
Slovenia 16p
—
Estonia 10p
Lithuania 10p
San Marino 1p

Comment: England have prevailed since the failure in the 2014 World Cup. 10 straight wins sent them to France in 2016. It will be interesting to see how far they can go in the main tournament this year! At the other end of the spectrum we have San Marino. They scored their first away goal in 14 years and almost got the draw against Lithuania but lost in overtime.

Group F

Northern Ireland 21p
Romania 20p
Hungary 16p
—
Finland 12p
Faroe Islands 6p
Greece 6p

Comment: The biggest mystery here is: what happened to Greece? Did the economic crisis affected them? From winning the 2004 European Championships to a last spot in the qualifiers. Horrible! Northern Ireland and Romania goes through to the EURO 2016 in a group that didn’t really scare anyone.

Group G

Austria 28p
Russia 20p
Sweden 18p
—
Montenegro 11p
Liechtenstein 5p
Moldova 2p

Comment: Austria has made an excellent qualifier and our guess is that they will go far in the main tournament. Sweden almost got the second place but had a horrible match 7 and 8 with two straight losses against their top competitors. Now, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and the rest of the team will have to rely on a couple of wins in the play offs instead. In the play offs for the 2014 World Cup in Brazil, Sweden lost against Portugal. Russia was awarded the win in the away match against Montenegro after their goalie being hit by a firework from the crowd.

Group H

Italy 24p
Croatia 20p
Norway 19p
—
Bulgaria 11p
Azerbaijan 6p
Malta 2p

Comment: A tough group where Norway almost got the second spot in the last match, but failed to keep the lead against Italy. They might end up playing their neighbours Sweden in the play offs. Croatia clinched the second place in the group despite of getting a penalty for racist symbols at their home field in the match against Italy.

Group I

Portugal 21p
Albania 14p
Denmark 12p
—
Serbia 4p
Armenia 2p

Comment: Portugal came out strong as expected. Albania was the big surprise in this group where many thought that Denmark would qualify directly to the UEFA 2016. Instead, they have to go through the play offs, perhaps against Sweden. Sadly, we see another point deduction from a team from former Yugoslavia. Serbia got penalized for a pitch invasion in the match against Albania.

We will be back with predictions after the play offs have been drawn!

State of Euro football, October 2015

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Most of Europe’s football leagues have been going for about a month now. In this post we will take a look at the top of the leagues versus the pre-season predictions. We will cover French Ligue 1, Italian Serie A, English Premier League, German Bundesliga and Spanish La Liga. Let’s take a look at the top four.

La Liga

Last year’s champions Barcelona is struggling in the Spanish league. They lost their last match away against Sevilla. Lionel Messi and Andres Iniesta injured. After 6-7 matches we find Villareal at the top of La Liga at 17 points. In second place Celta Vigo (with Swedish striker John Guidetti) is chasing at 15 points. Barcelona is third, also at 15 points. Real Madrid is at fourth place, with one match lesser played. While the top four teams have a couple of draw results each, Barcelona is the only among the four that have two losses. We will see if the Catalonians can turn the tide. There is also a political struggle in Spain which can result in Barcelona being excluded from La Liga: If Catalonia is declaring its independence from Spain, they won’t be a part of a) Spain b) The European Union or (perhaps worse) c) La Liga.

Premier League

The big pre-season favourite in Premier League was Jose Mourinho’s Chelsea. However, they have had a rough start of the season and are not a part of the top four. Instead, Manchester City is in the lead. They have got 18 points after 8 played matches. Arsenal and Manchester United is second and third at 16 points and Crystal Palace at fourth place with 15 points. The top three teams have 2 losses each. The rest of the Premier League might be hard to predict this year. Beforehand, we advised to consider placing a bet on Arsenal so we will stick with that.

Ligue 1

Many Swedes follows Paris Saint Germain in the French Ligue 1 because of Zlatan Ibrahimovic. PSG is in a clear lead to this date, 20 points, 2 points before second placed Angers, with one less match played. Caen and Rennes is at third and fourth place. Paris has got a good start of both Ligue 1 and Champions League. They will win many titles in French this year, but will they be at the top of the Champions League? Time will tell. The match against Spanish Real Madrid will be a good indicator of exactly how good PSG 2015-16 is.

Serie A

Juventus won serie A 2014-15. This year they lost a number of key players, Andrea Pirlo for example. They have had a rough start with only one win in seven tries so far. At the top we find Inter at 16 points, followed by Fiorentina at 15 points. Both teams have 5 wins in 7 respective 6 matches. Roma and Torino is third and fourth with four wins each. Although to early for any predictions, Juventus might keep struggling this season, having lost the team’s core.

Bundesliga

Bayern Munich was the big pre-season favourite and they are looking to deliver on that prediction. They are at the top of Bundesliga, 8 straight wins, 7 points before second placed Dortmund. Schalke and Hertha Berlin is at third and fourth spot. None of these teams can challenge Bayern for the domestic titles, however the fans are demanding more from Pep Guardiola’s men: They want the champions league where Bayern is currently two for two.

We will be back with another report from Europe’s soccer leagues in a month.

Source: Guardian.

Ronaldo scored 500th career goal

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In the second round of the 2015-16 Champions League group stage, Real Madrid was visiting Swedbank Stadium in Malmö, Sweden. Before the match, Real’s Portuguese superstar Cristiano Ronaldo had gone three games without a single goal. Frustrating, especially since he was just one goal away from the 500 goal milestone.

Ronaldo scored goal 500 and 501

As expected, Malmö FF had not much to put against the Spanish giant Real Madrid. Although the Swedes defended themselves with some success, in the end, this game was pretty much a question about how many goals Real Madrid should score. The possession was about 30-70 in favor of Madrid. After 28 minutes of play, Ronaldo got the ball in Malmö’s penalty area and he did no mistake: 0-1 Real, and he had finally scores his career goal number 500. The score could have been 0-2 after the first half, but Malmö was saved by the crossbar.
In the second half, Malmö got the chance to equalize the score, however their best striker, Markus Rosenberg, failed to convert on the header. Instead, lights went out with 12 minutes left of the match: Yoshimar Yotún got his second yellow card in the game and Malmö had to finish the match with 10 players on the field. If you are to have a chance against teams like Real Madrid, that’s not the way you want the match to develop. The red card was kind of harsh though, since Yotún pretty much just went into a duel for the ball.
After 90 minutes of play, Ronaldo scored his second goal of the match and 2-0 became the final result. He is now on even streak with Raul’s record of goals in Real Madrid (323) and will probably beat that record in short.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic scored for Paris SG

Paris Saint Germains and Zlatan Ibrahimovic played the other match in the group away against Ukrainian Sjachtar Donetsk. Aurier scored the first goal for PSG after 7 minutes of play and David Luiz scored the second halfway into the first half. Swedish striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic finalized the scoring to 3-0 late in the second half. That was his first goal of the 2015-16 Champions League. In the first match, PSG won against Malmö FF. PSG and Real now have 6 points each. October 21 they will face each other in Paris to see who gets the first spot in the group.

Other results:

FC Astana 2-2 Galatasaray
Mönchengladbach 1-2 Manchester City
Juventus 2-0 Sevilla
Manchester United 2-1 Wolfsburg
Atletico Madrid 1-2 Benfica
CSKA Moskva 3-2 PSV Eindhoven

Champions League 2015/16: Di María scored against Malmö

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El Clasico

In the first round of the 2015/16 Champions League Zlatan Ibrahimovic was put up against his countrymen when Paris SG played against Swedish Malmö FF at home. However, the Swedish striker scored no goals this time. Instead, Ángel Di María scored PSG:s first goal of the tournament in the fourth minute.

Malmö vs Zlatan and Ronaldo

Malmö qualified to this year’s Champions League by defeating Celtic. Then they were drawn in the same group as Real Madrid, Sjachtar Donetsk and Paris Saint Germain. A nightmare for most teams, but most people in Sweden actually cheered since the draw meant that we get to see some superstars playing football here in Sweden this winter. Malmö FF is the motherclub of Zlatan Ibrahimovic which makes those two matches special. Cristiano Ronaldo and Real Madrid is always a blast to watch. Oh, and maybe we will actually get a point or two against Sjachtar Donetsk from Ukraine. This is the second year in a row we have a Swedish club in the Champions League which kind of is a big deal since it is a rare sight. The question before tonight’s game was how Malmö was supposed to stop PSG’s “CIA”-line with Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Edinson Cavani and Ángel Di María? Di María was recruited from Manchester United after a failed season.

Paris SG 2-0 Malmö FF

In the first match of group A, PSG got a good start with Di María scoring after just four minutes of play. The Argentinian striker had a good match with plenty of plays and opportunities. Paris players used their technical superiority and outplayed Malmö large parts of the match. Zlatan had some troubles hitting the goal though, he missed about four-five chances in the first twenty minutes. Cavani was kind of invisible in the first half. Malmö did not create a lot of chances on their offense. In the second half, Zlatan neatly extended a pass to Cavani who scored 2-0 in the 61:st minute. That also became the final score in an entertaining match. We are looking forward to see what Malmö can do at home when the European teams have to face King (Swedish) Winter. In the next round, Malmö will play against Real Madrid in Sweden (Wednesday, September 30).

Results, Champions League

In the other matches, Ronaldo scored a hat-trick against Sjachtar Donetsk, Real Madrid winning 4-0. PSV Eindhoven won against Manchester United 2-1 (they did not have any Angel of Maria to salvage them anymore. Wolfsburg barely beat CSKA Moscow 1-0. In group C Beinfica won against FC Astana 2-0 which also became the result when Atletico got an away victory against Galatasaray. Last year’s finalist Juventus won against City in Manchester, 2-1. Sevilla won against Borussia Mönchengladback 3-0.

Iceland reached Euro 2016

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Island fotboll

Former Swedish coach Lars Lagerbäck and Iceland made history this qualification round for the European Football Championships in France 2016. For the first time in the country’s history they have reached a major soccer tournament. After defeating Netherlands in the first match of the round, all Iceland needed was one point in the last three games. The first chance was at home, against Kazakstan. After playing a goalless tie, the point was secured and also a spot in the Euro 2016. Netherlands at the other side, continue to struggle in the qualifiers with another loss (3-0) against Turkey. This places Netherlands in fourth place in the group and if the results doesn’t go their way they can miss the play offs.

Sweden struggles after another defeat

While Lagerbäck is enjoying succés with his Iceland, his countrymen in the Swedish national team under coach Erik Hamrén is struggling after two straight defeats. Before this qualification round they had a second place in group G, with Russia chasing four points behind. After losses against Russia away (0-1) and Austria at home (1-4), Sweden is now in fourth place, two points after Russia, one point before Montenegro. With just two matches to go, they probably have to aim for the play off in November where eight third placed teams of the groups will battle for four spots in the Euro 2016. All the group winners, second placed teams and the best third placed team will directly qualify to join France for the Euro 2016.

Wayne Rooney celebrates 50 goals for Three Lions

After England’s victory over San Marino, Wayne Rooney was in shared lead with Sir Bobby Charlton (and Own Goals!) as Britains all time top scorer with 49 goals. In the last match of this qualification round, he is now alone in top with 50 goals after a penalty kick goal. England defeated Switzerland 2-0.

Qualified teams so far

After this round’s qualification matches we have a number of teams that will join the host nation France in 2016: Iceland, England, Czech Republic and Austria. The next set of qualifiers are played October 8 – 13. The play offs are played November 12-17.

UEFA qualifiers 2016: Wayne Rooney, Sir Bobby Charlton and Own Goals in the top

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English Football

After a 6-0 victory against San Marino, England is qualified for the 2016 UEFA European Championships in France next summer. Wayne Rooney scored his 49th goal for England through a penalty shot in the 13th minute. This takes him in shared lead as England’s top goal scorer of all times together with Sir Bobby Charlton, who won the World Cup 1966 as well as the Baloon d’Or the very same year. However, in the game against San Marino, another contester for top goalscorer also stroke: Own goals. The 3-0 goal against San Marino was the 49th own goal ever for England. Question is: how good are the three lions really if they are so dependent on the other teams scoring on themselves?

Iceland defeated Netherlands for the second time

Former Swedish coach, Lars Lagerbäck, and his Iceland took a great step towards the Euro 2016 by defeating Netherlands 1-0. That’s the second victory for Iceland against the bronze medalists from 2014 FIFA World Cup. Netherlands had a bad night, with Arjen Robben injured and a red card in the second half together with a penalty shot against them in the second half. Iceland won fair and square and now only has to take 1 point in the last three games against Kazahkstan, Turkey and Latvia. Netherlands are in trouble though. They are in third place in the group, behind Iceland and Czech Republic, and are chased by Turkey. The top two teams of each group together with the best third team are directly qualified for the European Championships, while the rest of the third placed teams need to play play offs. Our guess is that Netherlands will reach the Euro 2016 by play off, but then they need to play a better game of football than they did against Iceland.

Sweden lost against Russia

Sweden went to Moscow with hopes to get at least a draw against Russia who struggle four points behind them in third place of group G. However, they didn’t do very well and Russia could score 1-0 in the first half. Swedish superstar Zlatan Ibrahimovic injured his back and was replaced by Ola Toivonen in the second half. Sweden could move up their positions and put some pressure on the offense, but failed to convert on their chances. Russia is now only 1 point behind Sweden. Sweden’s match against group leading Austria this Tuesday will be a key for how this group will end. Three points will probably be needed there if Sweden are to keep their second place and reach France 2016 without going through the play offs.
The qualifiers continues a few more days, 6-9th September. We will be back with more news after more matches are finished.