Europeam heavyweights and 1998 World Cup champions France have a battle on their hands if they want to qualify for the tournament in South Africa next summer. They drew with Group Seven leaders Serbia on Wednesday night leaving them four points off the Serbians
with just two games left. It now seems almost certain they will have to face a play-off tie to qualify for the tournament but Barcelona striker thierry Henry is confident his national side have what it takes to get them to South Africa in 2010.
He said: “Tonight we showed that there was a magnificent atmosphere between us,
“This is not the first time we have a spanner thrown into our works.
“We’ll fight for second place. We want to qualify for the World Cup, no matter how. This team have a soul.”
Henry scored the french equaliser in that tie and in fairness they will almosty certainly finish the group as runners up. They may trail first-placed Serbia by four points but they lead third place Austria by the same margin and I doubt many would bet against the French securing a play-off tie.
France have to face the Austrians in their final game which has a very slim possibility of being the decider as to who finishes second. However, before they play Austria they have a game against the Faroe Islands who have, in all honesty, no chance whatsoever of getting any kind of result against the European big boys. Only a fool would go betting on anything other than a French victory in that tie and they should have secured at least a place in the play-off rounds after that fixture. Even if they do make the play-off round there is no guarantee they will be heading to Africa next summer though with the Republic of Ireland, Croatia, Russia, Germany, Portugal or Sweden all possible opponents should the French seucre a play-off place.
Les Bleus boss Raymond Domenech is understandably under a great amount of pressure to qualify for the tournament. Should they fail to secure a spot in the World Cup he will almost certainly be out of a job but Domenech still had time to praise his players for their performance in Serbia and claims the team are improving under his stewardship.
He said: “I am proud of my players,
“Down to 10, they could have buckled and it was very close in the end. But they were exceptional.
“The team is improving. They now have to prove how far they have come in the two games which are remaining.”