DJHazey

You'd have to agree it'll be New Zealand automatically qualifying and I'd bet on either Papua New Guinea or New Caledonia being the intercontinental team. That will be the fun of OFC, the fact that a non-Kiwi nation will still make it to the pre-World Cup tournament.

Hoping for World Cup debuts for countries like Albania and Armenia as well as a return by Iceland (long shot) and long-awaited returns by Scotland, Israel, and Hungary.

There's still a chance, Ghana haven't been the same Ghana for years but in big games, you still would have to give them the edge over Mali until they prove it. Also, having that trio of Madagascar, Comoros, and Central African Republic is not easy, all traditionally tough places to go on the road and get 3 points. Could make a muck of things for the top two. Burkina Faso is trouble for Egypt though. Also, don't discount Cape Verde, who've held their own in recent years against Cameroon, often times paired with them in qualifying groups and African Cups. However, they're just way too inconsistent. They could go out and beat Cameroon 3-1 one day and then lose to Eswatini 0-2 the next. I don't really see any of the other top teams struggling, but you never know what surprises await.

Normally I would say Trinidad & Tobago could challenge too but their recent performance in the Gold Cup, including a 4-1 defeat to Jamaica tells me they're still not back to their former quality.

Best Chance: USA, France, Sweden, Germany Secondary Group: Netherlands, England, Canada, Brazil Darkhorse: Spain, Australia, Italy, Japan

This woould be a very competitive Path 3: Path 3: Luxembourg Azerbaijan Kosovo Bulgaria I'd be rooting for anything but Bulgaria to get some new blood in the tournament, especially Luxembourg.

USA: Goalkeepers: Alyssa Naeher (Chicago Red Stars), Casey Murphy (North Carolina Courage), Aubrey Kingsbury (Washington Spirit) Defenders: Sofia Huerta (OL Reign), Kelley O'Hara (Gotham FC), Emily Sonnett (OL Reign), Alana Cook (OL Reign), Crystal Dunn (Portland Thorns), Emily Fox (North Carolina Courage), Noami Girma (San Diego Wave) Midfielders: Ashley Sanchez (Washington Spirit), Julie Ertz (Angel City FC), Lindsey Horan (Lyon), Rose Lavelle (OL Reign), Andi Sullivan (Washington Spirit), Kristie Mewis (Gotham FC), Savannah DeMelo (Racing Lousiville) Forwards: Lynn Williams (Gotham FC), Sophia Smith (Portland Thorns), Alex Morgan (San Diego Wave), Megan Rapinoe (OL Reign), Trinity Rodman (Washington Spirit), Alyssa Thompson (Angel City FC) --- Alex Morgan (34) and Megan Rapinoe (38) might be in their last World Cups, with Rapinoe accepting a 'super sub' role this time. Young riser Trinity Rodman might have a recognizable name as she indeed the daughter of former NBA star Dennis Rodman. Julie Ertz and Rose Lavelle are both very important parts of this squad and are both coming off injuries.

Luxembourg joining Kazakhstan and Armenia in the eye-opening results category this round of qualifiers. Luxembourg has had the knack for this the past few years too, certainly have moved well above all the other classic European 'minnows' recently. Where they used to be the same category as San Marino, Andorra, Liechtenstein, Malta, and the Faroe Islands, they are no longer that. I'd argue they've surpassed Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Cyprus, and Belarus are now considered that 'almost in contention for playoffs' caetgory with the likes of Iceland, Montenegro, Kazakhstan, Georgia, Armenia, Bosnia, Slovenia, etc.

Kazakhstan sure are cooking right now. Scotland is on fire.

In the CONCACAF Nations League Semifinals it was: Canada 2-0 Panama United States 3-0 Mexico In the USA/Mexico match there were two separate fights that broke out in the second half after the Americans had secured their dominant scoreline. It was clear the Mexicans were a bit embarrassed to have this new CONCACAF ranking of them being 3rd fiddle to USA/Canada be confirmed the way it was. In one fight American Weston McKennie had a shirt completely ripped into shreds by a Mexican player after he went to the throat of someone. Both fights led to matching red-cards and the final 20 minutes were played 9 vs. 9. In the 12 minutes of stoppage time, the Mexicans fan continued to chant "puto!" whenever American GK Matt Turner did a goal kick. Something they've been doing for years and CONCACAF/FIFA have recently started to punish the football nation with 'closed home games' and have instructed the referee to pause the game. This refree did just that and of course it did nothing, so with 7 minutes to go in stoppage time he just blew to game over. This is normal behaviour whenever these teams face each other and why it is easily the biggest nation vs. nation rivalry in the world, in my opinion. In the final: United States 2-0 Canada Bayern Munich's Chris Richard score his first international goal and then another historical moment moments later as Arsenal's Folarin Balogun scored his first international goal in just his 2nd appearance! Balogun of course turned heads, when he shunned a chance to play for England's national team in the future and chose the United States instead. This has happened recently with other American players like Ricardo Pepi chose USA over Mexico and Sergino Dest chose USA over Netherlands. This current USA national team is one of the youngest in the world and stacked with talent.

Northern Ireland LOL

Wow! Way to go Tartan Army!

Danielle van de Donk <3 Makes the Netherlands games must-watch for me.

No surprise, it's something to do with FIFA being a corrupt organization again. Something to do with a bundled deal with the men's tournament and FIFA allotting all those funds to the men's tournament instead of splitting it up between men's and women's'. Thank goodness it will be televised in the U.S. via FOX as always.

Biggest Matches in June: Norway v. Scotland | Jun 17 | Group A Greece v. Ireland | Jun 16 | Group B France v. Greece | Jun 19 | Group B North Macedonia v. Ukraine | Jun 16 | Group C England v. North Macedonia | Jun 19 | Group C Turkey v. Wales | Jun 19 | Group D Belgium v. Austria | Jun 17 | Group F Austria v. Sweden | Jun 20 | Group F Montenegro v. Hungary | Jun 17 | Group G Finland v. Slovenia | Jun 16 | Group H Denmark v. Northern Ireland | Jun 16 | Group H Slovenia v. Denmark | Jun 19 | Group H Kosovo v. Romania | Jun 16 | Group I Switzerland v. Romania | Jun 19 | Group I Iceland v. Slovakia | Jun 17 | Group J Portugal v. Bosnia-Herzegovina | Jun 17 | Group J Iceland v. Portugal | Jun 20 | Group J

They could easily help with the travel though by grouping the races together, so for example all races in Asia are near each other on the calendar, and Europe for the next group, and North/South America for the next. I'm not looking at it now, but I know the calendar always seems to have this race here and then two weeks later the next is halfway across the globe. The structure of it is madness. I don't think it's too many races.

They literally took a month off in April and have another one in August. It could have been re-scheduled for middle of August f they wanted to.

I don't think viewers are watching a race to see how challenging it is for the drivers though. We were talking about entertainment value and now you're using this an argument for one over the other when it's meaningless to a television viewer. You never see 'half the field in the wall' at Monaco or a viewer would find that race exciting. So I guess they just decide they're not going to make any mistakes when they show up at Monaco?

Oh I'm sure there's still a myriad of problematic celebrity big-wigs at either venue.

No more 'glitz and glamour with no excitement in the actual race' than Monaco and we'll still get that every year.

I can't tell if the 0-0 scoreline tells a story of Slovakia's continued freefall at the international level or Luxembourg's version of a golden age the past few years with consistent decent results against countries you'd expect they'd have no business being in the game with. Also, brutal result for Iceland as the continue to head back towards being minnows again.

March 2023 Matches Group A | Mar 25 | Spain vs Norway Group A | Mar 25 | Scotland vs Cyprus Group A | Mar 28 | Scotland vs Spain Group A | Mar 28 | Georgia vs Norway Group B | Mar 24 | France vs Netherlands Group B | Mar 24 | Gibraltar vs Greece Group B | Mar 27 | Netherlands vs Gibraltar Group B | Mar 27 | Ireland vs France Group C | Mar 23 | Italy vs England Group C | Mar 23 | North Macedonia vs Malta Group C | Mar 26 | England vs Ukraine Group C | Mar 26 | Malta vs Italy Group D | Mar 25 | Croatia vs Wales Group D | Mar 25 | Armenia vs Turkey Group D | Mar 28 | Wales vs Latvia Group D | Mar 28 | Turkey vs Croatia Group E | Mar 24 | Czech Republic vs Poland Group E | Mar 24 | Moldova vs Faroe Islands Group E | Mar 27 | Poland vs Albania Group E | Mar 27 | Moldova vs Czech Republic Group F | Mar 24 | Austria vs Azerbaijan Group F | Mar 24 | Sweden vs Belgium Group F | Mar 27 | Austria vs Estonia Group F | Mar 27 | Sweden vs Azerbaijan Group G | Mar 24 | Serbia vs Lithuania Group G | Mar 24 | Bulgaria vs Montenegro Group G | Mar 27 | Hungary vs Bulgaria Group G | Mar 27 | Montenegro vs Serbia Group H | Mar 23 | Denmark vs Finland Group H | Mar 23 | Kazakhstan vs Slovenia Group H | Mar 23 | San Marino vs Northern Ireland Group H | Mar 26 | Slovenia vs San Marino Group H | Mar 26 | Kazakhstan vs Denmark Group H | Mar 26 | Northern Ireland vs Finland Group I | Mar 25 | Israel vs Kosovo Group I | Mar 25 | Belarus vs Switzerland Group I | Mar 25 | Andorra vs Romania Group I | Mar 28 | Switzerland vs Israel Group I | Mar 28 | Romania vs Belarus Group I | Mar 28 | Kosovo vs Andorra Group J | Mar 23 | Portugal vs Liechtenstein Group J | Mar 23 | Bosnia-Herzegovina vs Iceland Group J | Mar 23 | Slovakia vs Luxembourg Group J | Mar 26 | Luxembourg vs Portugal Group J | Mar 26 | Slovakia vs Bosnia-Herzegovina Group J | Mar 26 | Liechtenstein vs Iceland

Maybe but all four teams in a group will always have a way in, right down to the last match, so there's that.

FIFA is set to ratify a new format for the 2026 World Cup. The 48 teams will be put into 12 groups of 4, with the top 2 teams and 8-best third place teams advancing to a Round of 32 knockout stage. This increases the number of matches from 80 to 104.

Nice podium for Alonso and Aston Martin. Great debut for Sargent in 12th and Williams getting a point.