My international bet

**Steve Bruce** · 20/11/2007, 1:30 PM

I�ve a tenner on Northern Ireland & Latvia to win. Pays out 780(including the stake).

Obviously I have no expectations of winning the bet, but I might as well for a laugh, football is a funny old game and sometimes little miracles happen, if the unthinkable did happen, I have now funded my trip to the euros

**ifk101** · 21/11/2007, 7:34 AM

I think I might put a small wager on a Latvia/Northern Ireland double as well

The Swedes seem to be in a little bit of a panic. They've played a 4-4-2 throughout the qualifying but I read in the papers this morning that Lagerb�ck is thinking of playing a 4-5-1 tonight. Anytime Sweden has moved away from 4-4-2 under Lagerb�ck has ended in defeat. It also appears that R�sunda won't be full with yellowheads tonights. Only 22,000 tickets are sold for the match and R�sunda has a capacity of 37,000.

Spain has a lot of changes for tonight's game. Difficult to know if this will have a positive and negative effect on their performance - I'm sure a lot of the players coming in will be out to prove a point but with 9 changes from the team that played against Sweden, I can't see them throwing in the same high level of performance as they did against Sweden on Saturday night. Surely Northern Ireland must be more motivated that the Spanish coming into the match and David Healy seems like he only needs to look at the ball these days and it's a goal. However Northern Ireland don't win many away from home - the win against Liechtenstein is the only away victory I can think of since 2000 - but tonight's the night to put that statistic right.

**Steve Bruce** · 21/11/2007, 9:40 AM

I'm confident Northern Ireland can fulfill our side of the bargain. But not Latvia

**OwlsFan** · 21/11/2007, 4:47 PM

Can lightening strike twice in the same place? I doubt it but who knows.

**Steve Bruce** · 22/11/2007, 10:28 AM

It never looked likely at any stage. Spain far far superior.

**lopez** · 22/11/2007, 10:43 AM

Tried to get a double accumulator (or whatever it's called) with England and NI to qualify at Corals after searching the internet sites. No could do. England were 9-4, but no odds for NI to qualify. Obviously glad I didn't go for it now.

**Gather round** · 22/11/2007, 11:01 AM

Felicitaciones, Senor. Vamos a Suecia y Austria

However Northern Ireland don't win many away from home - the win against Liechtenstein is the only away victory I can think of since 2000

Aye, Malta 1-0 in qualifying for WC 2002.

**OwlsFan** · 22/11/2007, 1:07 PM

Originally Posted by Steve Bruce

It never looked likely at any stage. Spain far far superior.

Superior ok but not played off the park. In the early stages some lovely one touch football by Spain and NI hardly got a touch but defensively NI did ok. Deflected goal in the end to win the game.