Apart from World Cup qualifiers Euro 2008 is also happening at the moment. Some notable results:

• the host nations, Austria and Switzerland, both lost their opening games, to Croatia and the Czech Republic respectively, (Czech Republic then lost 3-1 to Portugal)
• the Netherlands belted Italy, the current World Cup champions, 3-0,
• Spain, despite being regular under-achievers, did the same to Russia 4-1,
• the current Euro champions, Greece, went down 2-0 to Sweden in their opening game,
• Germany looked strong in beating Poland 2-0, the 2 goals being scored by Polish-born Lukas Podolski.

Some games are being broadcast on SBS TV

The socceroos had been riding their luck for a couple of matches and this time it ran out. Mark Schwarzer again had a good match except for one lapse when he was caught off his line. Emad Mohammed lobbed him from 30 metres, the ball coming off the underside of the woodwork.

Australia didn’t have the fire power up front to dent the Iraqi defence. It looks like the Australian coach, Verbeek, went to Dubai looking for a draw, by stacking the team with defensive players, but it didn’t work out. The one good outcome is that Australia is not so dominant in the group and needs to take a positive attitude to the final two matches.

There is a highlights package on youtube.