Promising national teams which have failed to perform at the big stage (Part II)

After the 1st part here, we take a look at more teams who have shown promise but failed to really give a good show at major events.

Austria:

After the 1990 first round World Cup exit, Austrian football started having some problems. And then began the worst days of Austrian football. They had some humiliating defeats, like 9-0 against Spain and 5-0 against Israel. So humiliated were the Austrian fans that when Austria qualified for Euro 2008 as co-hosts, their own countrymen told the team to withdraw to spare the embarrassment for the nation. Expected to flop, they put on a spirited show, but went out in the group stages. Amazingly enough, Austria had never qualified for the Euros till 2008 and their last World Cup was in France 1998 where they exited in the first round. With most Austrian players playing in either Austrian Football Championship or the Bundesliga, Austrian football is steadily developing. Martin Harnik, Andreas Ivanschitz, Zlatko Junuzovic and Christian Fuchs are some players who show promise and let’s hope that under manager Marcel Koller, they reignite the Austrian glory of the 1970s.

Slovakia:

One may say it is unfair to call Slovakia an under performing team since they haven’t got any real chances to perform from the time it became an independent team after the dissolution of Czechoslovakia into Czech Republic and Slovakia. Slovakia has never qualified for the Euros but qualified for the 2010 World Cup and progressed to the Round of 16, which came as surprise, but eventually lost to eventual runners-up Netherlands. Martin Skrtel, Marek Hamsik, Miroslav Stoch and Filip Holosko are some well-known players of the Slovakian team. Though Slovakia have a long way to go, they are considerably a weaker side when compared to neighbours Czech Republic. Let’s hope they have a good qualifying campaign. Go Repre!

Wales:

One may not know it, but Wales is the third oldest national football team in the world. And more shocking is the fact that Wales’ last major tournament was in 1976 Euro which was played on home and away leg basis. A team where most of the squad members play in the Premier League, not have qualified for any major tournament in 36 years is just shocking. Utterly shocking! Indeed, times are tough for the Dragons and after the 2-0 defeat to Belgium in qualifying, Wales must stop wailing and look ahead in the future. Time to wake up!

Well, that’s it and I give my best wishes to all the teams which I have mentioned here, hoping that they will have successful qualifying campaigns.