Finally, the floodgates open

After 565 games the slow but steady trickle of qualifiers of France '98 is about to turn into a flood. The busiest weekend of the competition so far should see another seven teams from Europe bag their tickets to the World Cup finals, while a handful of hopefuls from Asia as well as North and South America will aim to move a step closer to realising their ambitions in key qualifying ties across the globe.

Whatever questions remain unanswered come Monday will be sorted out over the next six weeks and the 32 names should be well settled in time for the draw for the finals which takes place on December 4th in Paris. To date 13 countries have made sure of their place in that draw. France and Brazil are there automatically while South American heavyweights Argentina were among the first to earn a place through the qualification process.

Since then Colombia and Paraguay have come through in South America (where one more place remains to be decided), the five African places have been taken up by Cameroon, South Africa, Tunisia, Morocco and Nigeria while Romania, Bulgaria and Norway have made the running in Europe by wrapping up the first three of 14 slots earned from the increasingly protracted UEFA group stages.

From these European groups a couple of potential world champions should emerge today, with Germany all but certain to beat Albania to confirm their first place in Group Nine while, hype aside, the Italians really should see off the English to make sure of their place.

The Germans might have expected to be through by now but four draws (including one at home to Northern Ireland) have forced them to be patient. Having said that, once they are safely through they will start next summer as one of the favourites.

Never quite reconciled to their true position in the grand scheme of footballing things, however, there are those in the English camp who see them as would-be champions, while there is the inevitable pressure from a public for whom the results of the last 30 years prove little more than just how consistently unlucky you really can be in this game.

Glenn Hoddle's side have, of course, earned their crack at an automatic place by being more consistent against the lesser teams in Group Two but it would take some performance in Rome this evening to erase the memory of the 1-0 defeat at Wembley where the home side were outwitted, outmanoeuvred and outplayed by an Italian side who looked to be far more realistic challengers for the big prize next summer.

Elsewhere, Spain and the Netherlands will book their places unless they lose to the Faroe Islands and Turkey by huge scores while among the second placed teams it is the Scots who find themselves with their destiny in their own hands. If Craig Brown's men beat Latvia this afternoon then it's time to get into the recording studio, start haggling over the player pool arrangements and get signed up to a newspaper before what will inevitably be a first round exit from the finals.

We, meanwhile, are far from masters of our own destiny. Whatever happens against the Romanians at Lansdowne Road we are heading for Monday's play-off draw for the eight second-placed teams who must battle it out for the last four qualifying places out of Europe.

Russia are already confirmed as one of the eight in the hat and, aside from the losers of the great England versus Italy showdown, Yugoslavia are also likely to figure in that stage of the competition. The numbers may be completed by the likes of Croatia, Belgium, Finland and Ukraine.

Even the easy ones don't look so easy any more.

Outside of Europe, the big match of the weekend is in Santiago where Peru take on Chile in a match that will go a long way towards deciding the fourth and final qualifying place in South America. The two national coaches have been trading insults all week ahead of the game while there are reported to be any number of curses being cast.

On the pitch it should be as ugly as South American football ever gets (players hitting each other followed by red cards, followed by crowd violence towards referee, followed by the intervention of many riot police - much the same, in other words, as the good old-fashioned English game of the '70s) with both sides desperate for a win. If neither team manages to take the three points, then a win for Ecuador over Bolivia will revive their chances of stealing in for fourth spot.

Elsewhere, a win for Mexico over Canada (generally a decent bet at any odds) will see them through, while in Asia, South Korea can put one over on Japan, their co-hosts for the 2002 World Cup finals, by virtually wrapping up qualification with a win in Uzbekistan.

Iran look certain to join the Koreans as automatic qualifiers, while any one of half a dozen teams could end up taking the third spot or facing Australia for what will be the very last place to be decided, after the second leg of yet another play-off match on November 29th.