All the top football nations are sure of a place in the Euro 2012 finals to be held in Poland and Ukraine, the qualifiers of which came to an end last Tuesday.

Reigning champions Spain, Italy, Holland, England and Germany qualified with matches to spare, and they will be favourites to be crowned European champions when the competition will be held in June and July of next year.

Germany and Spain made a perfect run, while Italy, England and Greece also finished unbeaten, although they did not win all the matches. Sweden made it through as the best second-placed team, while Russia, France and Denmark qualified as winners in the three most tightly-contested groups.

Spain will be seeking to become the first nation to win back-to-back European championships interspersed with the World Cup victory, while Germany continue to build on solid ground. Italy, under coach Cesare Prandelli, have recovered from the upset in South Africa, while England continue to bring home results although Fabio Capello remains unloved as a manager.

Still, for the English to call for his replacement with Spurs’ Harry Redknapp – who has never won anything except for an FA Cup, while Capello has won honours wherever he has been manager – is beyond comprehension.

The biggest surprise is certainly the second place obtained by Estonia at the expense of Serbia. It is inexplicable how a team such as Serbia, which is composed of so many great individual players who play for the top clubs across Europe do not manage to blend themselves into a mighty team.

Estonia managed the unthinkable – gone are the days when they were beaten by Malta in what still remains as Malta’s only competitive away victory – and will now challenge for one of the remaining four places in the finals with Turkey, Montenegro, the Czech Republic, Ireland, Bosnia, Croatia and Portugal.

With regard to Malta, once again the team has not managed to win any of its games. Only one draw was obtained, against Georgia, which means that only Andorra and San Marino have fared worse than the boys in red. We can say that Malta was close to obtaining a point against Greece, and did quite well performance-wise on home soil, but still no other points were won.

It is a real pity that in spite of all the efforts that are made, the Maltese national side does not make the step forward and remains anchored in the bottom rungs of European football. But then, we can hardly expect any better.