Who Will Make The World Cup?

as seen on au.fourfourtwo.com

With the final matches for World Cup qualifying due to be completed this Wednesday, it’s time to analyze who can and who will make it to South Africa in 2010.

We’ll briefly and concisely go through the groups which are still open, paying attention only to sides still in the World Cup race and offer a few predictions along the way. It should be a riveting Wednesday, so here’s a preview to make sense of it all.

UEFA
European qualification sees the nine group winners all qualify directly to the World Cup, while the 8 best runners-up enter into two-legged playoffs. It is very likely Group 9’s runners-up Norway will miss out on the playoffs, so the rest battling for second spot in their respective groups have their eyes on the prize already.

Group 1
1.Denmark - 21 points (qualified)
2.Portugal – 16 points (prediction for playoffs)
3.Sweden – 15 points
The Portuguese can book a playoffs spot with victory over bottom-of-the-group Malta in Guimaraes, but anything less and Sweden can swoop when they host Albania in Stockholm.

Nevertheless, Portugal is in the box seat although the Swedes will be enthused by the news Cristiano Ronaldo won’t face Malta due to an ankle injury but they’ll still need a Maltese miracle.

for more of the same, from all the groups and confederations, click here...