The best UK team this weekend was Northern Ireland, with two draws, although they should have done better against the Faroe Islands. The worst team was Wales, who had two losses - to Montenegro and Switzerland. Scotland also had two losses, but they did too well against Spain to be the worst UK team this weekend. England barely scrape ahead of Scotland, as they should have done better against Montenegro.
Most unexpected result: Azerbaijan 1 – 0 Turkey. Surprising because Azerbaijan are 102nd in the world to Turkey's 21st. This is Azerbaijan's first win of Euro 2012 qualifying after losses against Germany and Austria. Turkey are suffering their second loss this weekend after Germany on Friday, but beat Begium and Kazakhstan previously.
Most predictable result: Armenia 4 – 0 Andorra. I'd have gone for the San Marino game, but they didn't get quite as bad a score as usual, since they were playing against Moldova. Actually, since the gap is smaller for Armenia and Andorra, San Marino are doing better than their fellow poor-scorers.
Most embarrassing result: Estonia 0 – 1 Slovenia. The only goal in this game was an Estonian own goal. Funnily enough, Serbia scored an own goal against Estonia on Friday, which got them the most embarrassing result for that round of qualification matches.
Most promising result: France 2 – 0 Luxembourg. France are winning again. Okay, Luxembourg are easy, but they also beat Romania. Perhaps they can start rising in the ranks again.
Most unusual result: Italy – Serbia. They're taking two of the 'awards tonight'. An abandonment counts as an unusual result in anyone's book. For completed games. This goes to Belgium 4 – 4 Austria, who are only one place apart in the FIFA rankings. This pair of Western European countries kept their fans excited to the end, with first one then the other team getting ahead. Two goals were scored in extra time – one by each team!
Cleanest game: Netherlands 4 – 1 Sweden. It was a toss-up between three games, but the Netherlands got it because of their improved form since the World Cup final.
Dirtiest game: Italy - Serbia. And it was the fans, not the players, who made this game dirty. Serbian fans, to be precise. They had already clashed with Italian police, and continued their poor behaviour at the stadium. As the players were emerging onto the pitch, some Serbian hooligans set off fireworks and threw flares onto the pitch. The players had to return to their dressing rooms as Italian riot cops confronted the fans. The match eventually started 40 minutes late, after a nasty booing of the Serbian national anthem by the Italian fans. After a mere seven minutes it was abandoned by the Scottish referee. Terrible! Why do British referees always get the bad games?
No comments:
Post a Comment