Ireland still the outsiders as qualification race breaks for the summer

Figuring out a way that Ireland can beat Austria away for the first time is likely to top Giovanni Trapattoni's close season agenda. Even then, however, Robbie Keane and co may need a little luck if they are to make it to the World Cup play-offs let alone Brazil.

Though three teams are currently tied for second place in Group C on 11 points, Austria’s significantly superior goal difference gives them a major advantage over Ireland and Sweden as the three rivals rest up ahead of the autumn’s qualification run-in.

That means that while Ireland could get away with beating either Sweden or Austria and drawing with the other in order to keep their hopes of a second-place finish alive, defeating Marcel Koller's side would make the rest of the permutations involved fractionally more straightforward.

Previous trips
The history of Ireland's previous trips to Austria is none too encouraging with five defeats (two of them by six goals) and just one draw – back in 1963 when a side that included Alan Kelly snr, Johnny Giles and Liam Tuohy managed to return from a European championship qualifier without having conceded.

On the evidence of the meeting between the two sides on March 26th going one better than that does not seem entirely out of the question but Trapattoni’s men would clearly have to improve on a performance that wasn’t good enough to wrap up a victory that appeared for a time to be well within their grasp.

There is the fact too that the Austrians, whatever their slide in the world rankings this month might suggest, would seem to be improving, an impression strengthened by their recent win over Sweden, a result that, combined with their 6-0 defeat of the Faroes, has left them best placed in the race to progress.

In the event that Ireland win their home game with Sweden and draw away to Austria, they would almost certainly be relying on the Swedes to take something from the Austrians when they meet in the penultimate round of matches although a win for the hosts could well leave them back in strong contention for qualification themselves with just Germany at home to play.

Inflict a defeat
Top spot would presumably be secure for Joachim Löw's side by then and if anyone can inflict a defeat on the group's current leaders then the evidence so far is that it is the one led by Zlatan Ibrahimovic.

With each of the three sides still having four games left to play, in any case, an awful lot can still happen after the summer but assuming each wins its solitary outstanding game against one of the group’s bottom two sides, Kazakhstan or the Faroe Islands, and actually loses to the Germans (none of which is guaranteed of course), then the runners-up spot will effectively come down to three remaining meetings between the rivals themselves.

Still, there are some reasons for optimism with both of Ireland's rivals having dropped points on their travels over the first six rounds of games with Austria managing only a draw in Kazakhstan and Sweden then losing in Vienna.

Looks implausible
Ultimately, though, beating them both looks pretty implausible while taking only three points from the two games would drastically shorten the odds on Ireland finishing last of the nine second-placed teams – in the unlikely event they did still finish second – an outcome that would cost them a place in the play-offs.

The nine second-placed sides will be ranked according to their results against the other four from their respective group’s top five (this is because one of the groups only contains five countries) and while Austria are currently fifth in what is, towards the bottom, a pretty tight race, Ireland would be last once its two wins over the Faroe Islands were excluded.