Spain will win in Norway, says Raul

REAL MADRID ace Raul is confident perennial underachievers Spain will make it to the Euro 2004 finals despite only scraping past Norway 2-1 in the first leg of their playoff tie.

“We are going to go and win in Norway,” Raul predicted ahead of Wednesday’s return leg in Oslo.

“We deserved a better result, but in the end, at least we have been able to win, and now we have to go and do it in Norway,” said teammate Joaquin Sanchez.

“If we’re not able to win this, then we don’t deserve to be in the finals in Portugal,” he added.

Raul grabbed the equaliser in Saturday’s game after Norway took a shock 13th minute lead. Spain then clinched the win after Norway skipper Henning Berg diverted a shot from Sanchez into his own net six minutes from time.

Meanwhile, Holland coach Dick Advocaat has called up PSV Eindhoven defenders Wilfred Bouma and Arjen Robben as cover for the suspended Jaap Stam and Frank de Boer as his side prepare to overturn a 1-0 deficit against Scotland in the second leg of their Euro 2004 playoff .

Lazio defender Stam is ruled out of the match in Amsterdam after picking up a yellow card in Saturday’s first leg at Hampden, while de Boer is struggling to be fit after injuring a thigh.

Maris Verpakovskis scored the only goal as Latvia beat Turkey in another play-off here, but the match was overshadowed for the Turks by the car bomb attacks which killed 20 people in Istanbul.

The start of the match had been held up after the referee ordered the Turks to change their boots as he claimed their studs were too long.

It was Verpakovskis who broke the deadlock in the 29th minute when he latched onto a long pass, turned inside Emre Asik and fired past goalkeeper Rustu Recber for his fourth goal in his last three internationals.

Turkey suffered a major setback 15 minutes from the end when Asik was sent off.

That red card will rule him out of Wednesday’s second leg in Istanbul, and he will be joined on the sidelines by Recber and Fatih Aykel, who were booked and will also be suspended.

Slovenia scored a priceless away goal and succeeded in holding Croatia to a 1-1 draw in the first leg of their playoff.

Croatia will have hoped for a better result after taking the lead with just five minutes of the match gone when the in-form Dado Prso, who scored four times for Monaco against Deportivo La Coruna in the Champions League this month, found the net after Ivica Mornar had headed Niko Kovac’s free kick across goal.

But Slovenia were level on 21 minutes when Ermin Siljak headed a long free kick from Milenko Acimovic past Croatian keeper Stipe Pletikosa.

France have started warming up for the defence of their European title in ideal fashion, confirming with a comprehensive victory over Germany that they will be the team to beat in Portugal.

After strolling through in a qualifying group featuring relatively modest opposition, coach Jacques Santini’s men showed by outplaying the Germans 3-0 in a friendly in Gelsenkirchen on Saturday that they could also tackle big names.

“This was an important test in our preparation,” Santini said after witnessing France’s finest performance since he took over in the wake of the shock first-stage exit from last year’s World Cup.

“The team proved they had a collective answer to a challenge from quality opposition,” he added.

France have now recorded 13 straight victories, one more than the previous national record set in 1984 by a great side spearheaded by Michel Platini.

Fine playmaking by Zinedine Zidane was instrumental as always, but it was France’s quicksilver forwards who won the game, Thierry Henry scoring once and David Trezeguet twice.

“There was an obvious difference in class,” Germany playmaker Michael Ballack.

“This hurts, and we have to live with it for the next three months, but I’m still convinced this team can achieve great things,” he said.

Colombia hit a new low in the 2006 World Cup qualifiers as a home defeat against outsiders Venezuela left them bottom of the South American group without a point after three games.

Argentina gave a performance that is unlikely to rekindle public interest, as they beat Bolivia 3-0 at a half-empty River Plate stadium, while Paraguay and Uruguay made home advantage count in 2-1 wins over Ecuador and Chile, respectively.

Argentina, still treated with suspicion by the public after last year's first -round exit at the World Cup, struggled for 57 minutes to break down a packed Bolivian defence before Andres D'Alessandro, Hernan Crespo and Pablo Aimar scored in quick succession.