Date:23/11/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/11/23/stories/2007112362842100.htm

Sport

England knocked out, Russia qualifies

Line-up for next year’s European Championship finalised

— Photo: AP/Reuters

GOING THROUGH THE WRINGER: Frank Lampard, David Beckham and Steven Gerrard can’t hide their disappointment after England’s 2-3 loss to Croatia.

LONDON: The powerhouse teams made it to Euro 2008.

All except one.

England won’t be joining World Cup holder Italy, three-time European champion Germany, France, Spain, Portugal, the Netherlands, defending champion Greece and the other seven qualifiers who will travel to Austria and Switzerland next June.

England lost 3-2 at home to Croatia on Wednesday and that means the likes of David Beckham, Wayne Rooney and Michael Owen will be watching the games on TV instead of playing in them.

The full line-up for next year’s European Championship was finalised on Wednesday when Portugal, Sweden, Turkey and Russia captured the last four spots.

Russia qualified with a 1-0 victory over Andorra but mainly because England squandered a two-point lead by losing 3-2 at Wembley. After Beckham came off the bench and provided the cross to set up Peter Crouch for an equaliser at 2-2, it looked as if England had captured the point it needed to edge out the Russians.

But Mladen Petric scored a long-range winner for Croatia with 13 minutes to go to silence the Wembley crowd of 88,000.

While the other teams prepare for the Euros, England faces nothing but friendlies until it reaches the World Cup qualifying matches, details of which will be decided at the draw in Durban, South Africa, on Sunday.

Marcus Allback scored a first-minute goal to put the Swedes on the way to Euro 2008 in a 2-1 victory over Latvia in Group F.

Spain finishes on top

Spain, which already had qualified from the group, finished at the top by beating Northern Ireland 1-0.

Turkey defeated Bosnia-Herzegovina 1-0 with a 43rd-minute goal by Nihat Kahveci in Istanbul. The 2002 World Cup semifinalist advance along with defending European champion Greece, which already had guaranteed a place and finished at the top of Group C after winning at Hungary 2-1.

Greece goes to Euro 2008 with the best qualifying record of 10 victories, one loss and one draw.

Turkey’s narrow victory was enough to edge out Norway.

Before Wednesday’s games, 10 teams had qualified to join co-hosts Austria and Switzerland in next year’s championship — three-time winner Germany, World Cup champion Italy, Greece, France, Czech Republic, Spain, the Netherlands, Romania, Poland and Croatia.

The results:

Group A: Armenia 0 lost to Kazakhstan 1 (Sergey Ostapenko 64); Azerbaijan 0 lost to Belgium 1 (Luigi Pieroni 52); Portugal 0 drew with Finland 0; Serbia 2 (Nikola Zigic 69, Danko Lazovic 71) drew with Poland 2 (Rafal Murawski 28, Radoslaw Matusiak 47).

Group B: Georgia 0 lost to Lithuania 2 (Audrius Ksanavicius 52, Mindaugas Kalonas 90+5); Italy 3 (Frodi Benjaminsen own goal 10, Luca Toni 36, Giorgio Chiellini 41) bt Faroe Islands 1 (Rogvi Jacobsen 83); Ukraine 2 (Andriy Voronin 14, Andriy Shevchenko 46) drew with France 2 (Thierry Henry 20, Sidney Govou 34).

Group C: Hungary 1 (Akos Buzsaky 7) lost to Greece 2 (Vilmos Vanczak own goal 22, Angelos Basinas 56 pen); Malta 1 (Michael Mifsud 53) lost to Norway 4 (Steffen Iversen 25, 28 pen, 45, Morten Gamst Pedersen 75); Turkey 1 (Nihat Kahveci 43) bt Bosnia-Herzegovina 0.

Group D: Cyprus 0 lost to Czech Republic 2 (Daniel Pudil 11, Jan Koller 74); Germany 0 drew with Wales 0; San Marino 0 lost to Slovakia 5 (Lubomir Michalik 42, Filip Holosko 51, Marek Hamsik 53, Marek Cech 57, 83).

Group E: Andorra 0 lost to Russia 1 (Dmitri Sychev 39); England 2 (Frank Lampard 56 pen, Peter Crouch 65) lost to Croatia 3 (Niko Kranjcar 8, Ivica Olic 14, Mladen Petric 77); Israel 1 (Elyaniv Barda 35) bt Macedonia 0.

Group F: Denmark 3 (Nicklas Bendtner 35, Jon Dahl Tomasson 45, Thomas Kahlenberg 59) bt Iceland 0; Spain 1 (Xavi 52) bt Northern Ireland 0; Sweden 2 (Marcus Allback 1, Kim Kallstrom 57) bt Latvia 1 (Juris Laizans).

Group G: Belarus 2 (Vitaly Bulyga 50, Vladimir Korytko 65) bt Netherlands 1 (Rafael van der Vaart 89); Romania 6 (Nicolae Dica 21, 72 pen, Gabriel Tamas 53, Daniel Niculae 63, 65, Ciprian Marica 69 pen) bt Albania 1 (Edmond Kaplani 65); Slovenia 0 lost to Bulgaria 2 (Blagoy Georgiev 81, Dimitar Berbatov 840). — AP

* * *

The qualifiers

Poland, Portugal, Italy, France, Greece, Turkey, Czech Republic, Germany, Croatia, Russia, Spain, Sweden, Romania, Netherlands, Switzerland and Austria