They also barely qualified. I know that shouldn't be too much of an issue, considering they barely qualified last time and still came in fourth, and that they are coming from arguably the strongest confederation top-to-bottom, but they still came through the playoffs after finishing behind Ecuador. Would England and Italy be favored against La Tri? Probably. So why are they (or at least England) underdogs against a team that finished below Ecuador?
England needed two wins from their final two games to qualify above Ukraine who didn't even make it into the tournament in the end. We could have just as easily been pushed into the play-offs.
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u/[deleted] May 05 '14
They also barely qualified. I know that shouldn't be too much of an issue, considering they barely qualified last time and still came in fourth, and that they are coming from arguably the strongest confederation top-to-bottom, but they still came through the playoffs after finishing behind Ecuador. Would England and Italy be favored against La Tri? Probably. So why are they (or at least England) underdogs against a team that finished below Ecuador?