Great result last night (1-1 in Romania, 3-2 on agg) and achieved with the three classiest players missing for both legs (No Zahovic, no Knavs, no Cimerotic). Mladen Rudonja (of Portsmouth) scored his first goal in his 53rd international (and he plays up front half of the time) and dogged defence completed the job. A fantastic achievement for a country of 2 million whose main sport is skiing. Katanec (the manager) will be in big demand after this.

-- Anonymous, November 15, 2001

Answers

Just saw some highlights.... some good footy by the look of it

-- Anonymous, November 15, 2001

Scrappy first half, but opened up in the second. Tactical coup by Katanec saw him put both of his quick flank players on the left to counter Contra, leaving Chivu virtually unmarked on their left. Chivu is a cracking young player (he produced an amazing bit of skill to go past two players in the first leg), but didn't have the confidence to exploit the space. Aggression shut the Romanians out and Slovenia should have scored a second towards the end. Katanec has already been approached by John Toshack for Real Sociedad, and I think he's likely to go somewhere else after the World Cup. Superior management saw off Hagi, who is too inexperienced and probably too arrogant. Lessons to be learned. BTW watch out for Knavs (as I keep saying): he should be back in the spring (injured for Kaiserslautern during their superb start to the season, since which they've started losing) and will show himself to be one of the best young defenders in the world.

-- Anonymous, November 16, 2001