{"id":2023,"date":"2025-11-18T22:36:05","date_gmt":"2025-11-18T22:36:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/?p=2023"},"modified":"2025-11-18T22:36:05","modified_gmt":"2025-11-18T22:36:05","slug":"spain-belgium-switzerland-scotland-and-austria-secure-automatic-world-cup-spots","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/?p=2023","title":{"rendered":"Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, Scotland and Austria Secure Automatic World Cup Spots"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"subnav-title ff-ffc bold fs-23 lh-25 uc pd-b-10\">\n            POPULAR SEARCHES\n          <\/p>\n<p class=\"subnav-title ff-ffc bold fs-23 lh-25 uc pd-b-10\">\n            BROWSE BY\n          <\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-b1ca39d9>European qualifying for the 2026 World Cup finished Tuesday with Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, Scotland and Austria securing the region\u2019s remaining automatic spots.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-b1ca39d9>Spain was held to a 2-2 home draw at Turkey but guaranteed first place in Group E and equaled Italy&#8217;s 31-match unbeaten streak in competitive matches. Italy&#8217;s record came between 2018 and 2021.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-b1ca39d9>Scotland beat 10-man Denmark 4-2 in Group C, with Scott McTominay scoring a superb bicycle kick goal three minutes into the match.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-b1ca39d9>A 1-1 home draw against Bosnia and Herzegovina was enough for Austria in Group H, while Belgium routed Liechtenstein 7-0. Switzerland qualified after a 1-1 draw at Kosovo.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-b1ca39d9>The 12 group winners qualified directly, while the runners-up will participate in playoffs along with the four best-ranked group winners of the 2024-25 Nations League that did not finish first or second in their groups.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-b1ca39d9>The playoffs will be played on March 26 and March 31. The World Cup will be played in the United States, Mexico and Canada from June 11-July 19.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-b1ca39d9><i>Reporting by The Associated Press.<\/i><\/p>\n<p class=\"ff-h fs-16 lh-1pt6 mg-b-15 article-content\" data-v-b1ca39d9><i>Want great stories delivered right to your inbox?<\/i><i><u>\u00a0Create or log in to your FOX Sports account<\/u><\/i><i>, and follow leagues, teams and players to receive a personalized newsletter daily!<\/i>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>POPULAR SEARCHES BROWSE BY European qualifying for the 2026 World Cup finished Tuesday with Spain, Belgium, Switzerland, Scotland and Austria securing the region\u2019s remaining automatic spots. Spain was held to a 2-2 home draw at Turkey but guaranteed first place in Group E and equaled Italy&#8217;s 31-match unbeaten streak in competitive matches. Italy&#8217;s record came [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":2022,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2023","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-soccer"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2023","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2023"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2023\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2022"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2023"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2023"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/play-live.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2023"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}