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International hot or not
Northern Ireland’s answer to Gareth Bale - Conor McLaughin © Getty
What’s sexy, and not so sexy, in football this week…
HOT
Iceland
One of the last words you’d expect to see describing Iceland is “hot” - whether it’s the tiny Nordic nation or the Kerry Katona-endorsed frozen food connoisseurs. But in European football terms, the country - if not the supermarket - is sizzling like a barbecue at Cristiano Ronaldo’s house. And all because they drew 0-0 with Kazakhstan. The goalless draw sealed Iceland’s qualification for a major tournament for the first time in its history and also ensured they will finish above Holland. In supermarket terms, it’s like Waitrose going out of business because the entire British middle-class has decided to only eat fish fingers.
Slovenia
It’s hard to find a Euro 2016 qualifying group more boring than England’s. While Roy Hodgson’s side have looked dead certs to qualify since the first game, it’s also been widely assumed that Switzerland will finish second because their rivals are not very good. And things were all going to plan until the Swiss went 2-0 down at home to unfancied Slovenia on Saturday - a scoreline that would have seen the underdogs leapfrog their opponents in the table. Slovenia held out until the 80th minute, before Switzerland scored three goals in an incredible last 10 minutes. So the assumption about the Swiss finishing second turned out to be correct. But credit to the Slovenians for making Group E spectacularly exciting, if only for 45 minutes.
Conor McLaughlin
While Gareth Bale’s multi-million pound Galactico face, contorted with either joy or frustration, has accompanied us along every step of Wales’s glorious Euros qualifying campaign, Northern Ireland have been making their way towards France 2016 in quieter but no less remarkable fashion. There are no superstars in Michael O'Neill’s squad (sorry Jonny Evans, you don’t quite make the grade) but a series of solid results has put the team ranked 129th by Fifa just three years ago top of Group F. It means the likes of Fleetwood Town right-back McLaughlin, along with his team-mates Paddy McCourt, Niall McGinn and Josh Magennis, look set to rub shoulders with Bale and Ronaldo next summer.
NOT
Euro 2016
Holland were smashed by Turkey on Sunday, having earlier been humbled by Iceland for the second time, leaving them languishing fourth in Group A. You might think that means they Dutch are out - and normally, you’d be right - but not this time. Due to the European Championships increasing from 16 to 24 teams, it’s almost harder not to qualify for Euro 2016 than it is to qualify. So despite the Netherlands being repeatedly humiliated, they still have a half-decent chance of going to France if they win their last two games. Good news for the organisers who want all the big teams competing; bad news for the rest of us who want to laugh at Arjen Robben.
Christian Benteke
Liverpool’s £32m man was substituted at half-time in Belgium’s unconvincing 1-0 victory against Cyprus. Boss Marc Wilmots accused Benteke of giving a “half-performance”, and he didn’t mean because he only played half the match, although it was a slightly confusing rebuke given that Benteke literally did perform in half the match. What Wilmots actually meant was that Benteke gave a “half-performance” while he was on the pitch, so technically he gave a quarter-performance. Either way, the point is that Benteke was rubbish.
Greece
The Greek people have been put through the mill recently, but the fragility of their economy is nothing compared to the ineptitude of their football team. The ghastliness of Greece’s Euro 2016 qualifying is without parallel: defeated home and away by the Faroe Islands and sitting bottom of probably the easiest group in the tournament, without a win or any chance of a bail-out. Saturday’s home defeat to Finland was the latest nasty reminder that 2004 was a long time ago.
