After the weekend fixtures in different leagues all over the world players went into the international break to pave way for world cup qualifiers fixtures beginning today evening.
This year’s world cup tournament will take place in Qatar in the months of November and December. Fifteen teams namely Germany, Denmark, France, Belgium, England, Switzerland, Serbia, Netherlands, Croatia, Brazil, Argentina, Iran, South Korea and Spain have qualified for the tournament. Qatar has a direct qualification as the host country. The remaining seventeen spots will be known after the qualifiers.
Portugal will host Turkey in a match expected to be entertaining. Both teams missed the chance for direct qualification after finishing second in their groups. This will be the fourth world cup qualifier tier for Portugal while it’s the first for Turkey. The hosts have a good record in the qualifiers having won all their previous qualifier matches with an average of two goals scored. Turkey will be trying to reach their first world cup tournament since 2002.
In another enticing fixture,the reigning European champions Italy will welcome North Macedonia. Italy finished second behind Switzerland after failing to win in their four of their last five fixtures in the group stage. They will be trying to avoid suffering successive world cup failures for the first time in their history. North Macedonia reached the qualifying stage after pulling surprises in their group stage after finishing second behind Germany. They will be willing to make their debut in this tournament this winter but they will have to get past Italy.
Other fixtures see Sweden face Czech republic at home while Wales host Austria. The match between Scotland and Ukraine was postponed due to the invasion of Ukraine by Russia. Poland on the other hand was awarded a walk over against Russia due to world football governing body FIFA barning Russia from participating in any footballing activities due to the invasion of Ukraine by its government.
All matches will kick off at 2245hrs EAT.
In other matches of the Asian content, Australia face Japan, South Korea vs Iran, Lebanon vs Syria, Vietnam vs Oman, China vs Saudi Arabia and Iraq against United Arab Emirates.
