Another interlull upon us–no club matches, as the top players are jetting around to join their national sides. There’s a full and relatively interesting slate of Euro2012 qualifiers, given the that qualifying group stage finally wraps up on Tuesday: 20 fixtures today, out of which we’ve picked 5 to keep an eye on, and then 22 more on Tuesday.
We start with five Euro qualifiers plus one friendly; we’ll be back over the course of next few days with picks for Saturday, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday (hence the “Part 1 of n”, where n is somewhere between 1 and 4).
In fact, all five of the matches we’ve chosen are between the top two teams in their respective group tables–which is what’s important of qualification. The 9 group winners qualify directly for the tournament in Poland & Ukraine next summer, as well as the runner-up with the best record. The other 8 group runners-up get paired for a 2-legged playoff round, yielding 4 more qualifiers. Add to that the hosts, and we’ll finally have our 16 team field for Euro2012 set by the end of November.
The five matches to watch today, which have some interesting group dynamics, as you can infer from the top of the current group tables:
Turkey vs Germany 2:30pmET foxsoccer.tv: The top of Group A looks like this: Germany way ahead (perfect 8-0 record so far for 24 points), Turkey in 2nd (14 pts), Belgium close behind (12 pts). And Belgium is playing cellar dwellers Kazakhstan at home in Brussels–so basically Turkey needs to knock off the big dogs of Deutscheland.
A potentially interesting set of matchup in midfield, as Hamit Altıntop will have to deal play against his Real Madrid teammates Sami Khedira and Mesut Ozil. This matchup of course always puts extra focus on Ozil, given that he’s a rising superstar who born in (West) Germany but is of Turkish descent (3rd-generation Turkish-German, in fact–which points the long but complicated socioeconomic relations between these two nations).
Czech Republic vs Spain 2:45pmET ESPN Deportes, ESPN3.com: Exact same dynamic in Group I–Spain is perfect (18 points), Czech Republic in 2nd (10 pts) but only 2 points ahead of 3rd place Scotland (8 pts)–with the latter playing minnows (Lichtenstein in this case)
Serbia vs Italy 2:45pmET ESPN3.com, foxsoccer.tv (tape at 7 p.m. on ESPN Deportes): Similarly in Group C–Italy close to perfect (22 points), but Serbia (14 pts) trying to hold off Estonia (13 pts)
Greece vs Croatia 2:45pmET ESPN3.com (tape at 9:30 a.m. Saturday on ESPN Deportes): A bit different in Group F, where it looks like these two teams will finish in the top 2–but it’s not clear in what order. Current standings: Croatia (19 points), Greece (18 points), Israel (13 points).
Montenegro vs England 3pmET ESPN3.com: England need just a point to clinch the top spot in group, while Montenegro needs to make sure they don’t allow Switzerland to catch them for 2nd place (England 17 pts; Montenegro 11 pts; Switzerland 8 pts)
For all the other group standings and fixtures, head over to UEFA’s Euro2012 site.
And finally, here’s one friendly to watch:
Costa Rica vs Brazil 10pmET ESPN Deportes, ESPN3.com: CONCACAF’s Costa Rica hosts the Seleção.
