Countdown to the World Cup

Once the draw is made then you can almost feel the World Cup taking a gigantic step nearer. It is possible now to almost feel the games and Group A should be very interesting from a football betting standpoint. Many people are saying that South Africa are weak but I am not so sure. I think that come the finals next year then they will put in some credible performances that could see them take second place in the group.

They do however also stand a very good chance of becoming one of the worst performing host nations in recent memory. Locked into a group that involves France, Uruguay and Mexico then they will find it tough to progress. Many people will be making France favourites for this group and the football betting odds will reflect that.

But this is a side that came within a whisker of not even qualifying at all. France came second in their group behind Serbia and were taken to the very brink by Ireland before Thierry Henry’s handball handed a golden opportunity to William Gallas to head into an empty net.

This is not the France of old, a far cry from the team who dominated the world when winning the 1998 World Cup and the 2000 European Championships. I think that reaching the last World Cup Final seemed to have glossed over the problems and Raymond Domenech has certainly had his critics.

But France do not always do what is expected of them and who can forget their tame exit from the 2002 tournament. Mexico are always a side to be respected and tend to have respectable World Cup’s and Uruguay who were the winners in 1930 and 1950 are long overdue a good run in the finals.

So France may not have it all their own way in this group and I certainly do not expect them to do so. In fact based on how they qualified then I don’t expect the French to get much by way of neutral support. This is hardly their fault, a proud nation like France certainly would not have wanted to qualify in the way that they did.

However the facts remain that they are there now and nothing can alter that. Uruguay have always been behind their big two South American rivals by way of recent success and that will likely continue in this tournament. The last time that Uruguay went deep into a World Cup was in 1970 when they reached the last four losing 1-0 to West Germany and they were also grouped in with West Germany in 1986 in Mexico as well.

This group was famous for one reason, it launched one of the most widely spread “labels” in football….. “The Group of Death”. West Germany, Uruguay, Denmark and Scotland formed the first ever “Group of Death”. Uruguay on their day can prove to be a match for anyone and they have some world class players but they can be erratic as well which was seen in that tournament when Denmark took them apart to the tune of a 6-1 shoreline.

Carl “The Dean” Sampson