Iceland Becomes Smallest Country Ever to Reach World Cup After Defeating Kosovo 2-0

Iceland now joins host-nation Russia, defending champion Germany, Spain, England, Belgium, Poland and Serbia in the European contingent for the 2018 tournament.

Written by: India.com Sports Desk

Published: October 10, 2017, 10:31 AM IST

https://www.india.com/sports/iceland-becomes-smallest-country-ever-to-reach-the-world-cup-after-defeating-kosovo-2-0-2524050/

Iceland Becomes Smallest Country Ever to Reach World Cup After Defeating Kosovo 2-0

Image: @EuroQualifiers/Twitter

New Delhi: Iceland football team created history by qualifying for the World Cup for the first time. Iceland defeated Kosovo 2-0 to book a place in the next year’s World Cup. Interestingly, Iceland, with a population of 334,000 people, becomes the smallest country ever to reach the World Cup.

Iceland now joins host-nation Russia, defending champion Germany, Spain, England, Belgium, Poland and Serbia in the European contingent for the 2018 tournament.

The winners of Groups A and B — set to be decided on Tuesday — will also directly qualify, while eight of the nine second-place teams are to face each other next month in a playoff to fill the four remaining European slots.

Gylfi Sigurdsson and Johann Gudmundsson scored as Iceland bested winless Kosovo 2-0 to finish the qualifiers with 22 points, good enough for first place in Group I.

Trailing the Nordic side by two points are Croatia, who got a pair of goals from Andrej Kramaric to win 2-0 at Ukraine to claim second place and a berth in the playoffs.