Scotland reached the FIFA World Cup finals for the first time since 1998 in thrilling fashion as stoppage time goals by Kieran Tierney and Kenny McLean secured a nerve-shredding 4-2 victory over Denmark at a rocking Hampden Park.<\/p>\n
When Patrick Dorgu brought 10-man Denmark level for the second time in the 81st minute it seemed the visitors would secure the point they needed to top Group C and book a place at next year’s tournament in the US, Canada and Mexico.<\/p>\n
But Tierney struck a superb shot past Kasper Schmeichel in third minute of stoppage time and then, with the goalkeeper up in attack at the other end of the pitch, McLean launched a long-range effort into an empty goal to spark delirious scenes.<\/p>\n
Scott McTominay gave Scotland the lead with an overhead kick in the third minute. But Rasmus Hojlund equalised with a penalty in the 57th shortly before the visitors had Rasmus Kristensen sent off. Lawrence Shankland then put the Scots back in front.<\/p>\n
European champions Spain secured their place in the finals after a nervy 2-2 draw with Turkey in Seville.<\/p>\n
Belgium hammered Liechtenstein 7-0 to confirm their berth, finishing their campaign unbeaten. Wales finished second in the group.<\/p>\n
Austria qualified after snatching a 77th minute equaliser against visitors Bosnia and Herzegovina to earn a 1-1 draw and top their group.<\/p>\n
Switzerland qualified despite being held 1-1 by Kosovo, with the Swiss topping their group and Kosovo finishing second.<\/p>\n
12 teams have so far qualified out of Europe – Croatia, England, France, Germany, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Belgium, Spain, Switzerland, Austria and Scotland.<\/p>\n
16 other teams now contest the play-offs for the remaining four spots out of Europe.<\/p>\n
Source: Reuters & RNZ<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Scotland reached the FIFA World Cup finals for the first time since 1998 in thrilling fashion as stoppage time goals by Kieran Tierney and Kenny McLean secured a nerve-shredding 4-2 victory over Denmark at a rocking Hampden Park. When Patrick Dorgu brought 10-man Denmark level for the second time in the 81st minute it seemed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":15734,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15733","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15733","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15733"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15733\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15735,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15733\/revisions\/15735"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15734"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15733"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15733"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thebuzz.apnanetwork.co.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15733"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}