Football Teams of the Euro 2012 European Championship Finals in Poland and Ukraine

The European Championships Finals, better known as Euro 2012 will be hosted by Polandand Ukraine. The tournament begins on 8^th June 2012. The road to qualification has seen the usual shocks and upsets. Sixteen teams make the finals.

The sixteen teams are made out of teams in Europewith world ranking of first to the 64^th. Admittedly, one of the hosts, Poland holds the 64^th world ranking. Poland finds themselves in two consecutive European Championship finals with the appearance before Euro 2012 being at Euro 2008. UnlikePoland, for the co-hostsUkraine, Euro 2012 is the first appearance in a European Championship final.

Euro 2008 and World cup 2010 winners Spainqualifies for Euro 2012 with the number one world ranking. All eyes would be on Spain during the tournament as bookies favourites. Spain also qualifies with a one hundred percent record in the group stages winning all eight games and averaging over three goals a game.

World’s number two ranked team Netherlands have been prolific in their qualifications also. Netherlands scored an astonishing 37 goals on their road to Euro 2012 partly thanks to their goal machine Huntelaar, who is responsible for 12 of the goals. However, unlike Spain, Netherlands does not hold a one hundred percent winning record. Netherlands qualifies with 27 points thanks to nine wins and one loss.

Germany, world’s number 3 also qualifies with a one hundred percent record. Three times winners and veterans of the European Championship tournament with ten appearances scored an impressive 34 goals with 9 of them scored by Milaslov Klose.

World’s number six and seven ranked teams Italyand Englandalso qualified without too much drama. Both teams with a one hundred percent record in the Group stages scored a relatively modest 20 and 17 goals respectively. Although ranked relatively high, England has never won the European Championships with their best result coming as a semi finalist in 1968.

Euro 2004 winners Greece, with all its financial troubles and woes also qualify for the Euro 2012 finals with a one hundred percent record. Greece although ranked at 8^th just after England are not seen as a potential winner by the bookies. Denmark also qualifies with a world ranking of 10^th for Euro 2012 along with Russia who are ranked 13^th in the world. France completes the lowest world ranked qualifier to qualify as group winners. The Group D winners France are ranked as 15^th of the world.

The spot available for the best runner up goes to Swedenwho qualifies for Euro 2012 as the runner up of Group E behind the Group E winners the Netherlands.

The last four places of Euro 2012 are reserved to the winners of the play offs. Portugal ranked 9^th, Croatia ranked 12^th, Republic of Ireland ranked 25^th and Czech Republic ranked 47^th in the world qualify for the European Championship finals in 2012.

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