It seemed like a formality: a victory in the last two – objectively easy – matches, against Denmark and Armenia, was enough to enter the eight seeds of the World Cup, as per the Italian tradition. And instead Prandelli's Italy has succeeded in the "feat" of not making it, first barely saving himself in Copenhagen, then even risking a home defeat against Cinderella Armenia, despite Supermario Balotelli's entry and goal.
Not even the Rossoneri phenomenon, author of the useless 2-2 goal, was in fact able to straighten out a bad match, which relegates Italy to the second tier to the advantage of Colombia, Uruguay (who, however, will first have to win the play-off against Jordan) and none other than Switzerland, who starting quietly has carved out a place among the protagonists of the Brazilian World Cup and will be with Belgium (another surprise), Germany and Spain the other European national team among the big names, to the detriment of much more famous teams such as Holland, England (who got the pass yesterday), Portugal (which instead will go to the playoffs) and precisely Italy, which would have been enough either to win one of the two matches or even just for one between Colombia, Uruguay and Switzerland to draw.
Yesterday meanwhile it is also almost completed the qualifying framework for Brazil 2014: the European groups have designated another four, with England, Spain, Capello's Russia and for the first time independent Bosnia which are added to Italy, Holland, Belgium, Germany and Switzerland, while Portugal, Greece, Ukraine, Croatia, France, Iceland, Sweden and Romania will compete for four places via a play-off with two-legged matches to be played in November (with the top four seeds).
Everlasting in November the play-off between Uruguay and Jordan and the one between Mexico and New Zealand will be played, while Argentina, Colombia, Chile and Ecuador (for South America, as well as obviously Brazil), Costa Rica, the USA and Honduras (for Central and North America), Iran, Japan and South Korea (for the Asian area) are already qualified and Australia for Oceania.
