Daniel McDonnell / 20 October 2009 Free Bet View Market

Whether Giovanni Trapattoni would agree remains to be seen. While the Ireland manager refused to speak publicly about the permutations before yesterday's draw in Zurich, his assistant Marco Tardelli said last week that France were the team to avoid in his book. And he generally reads from the same page as Trapattoni.

Allied to being drawn at home first - something which Trapattoni definitely didn't want as he believes referees could be influenced by a partisan crowd in the decisive second leg - it's hard to be too optimistic about Ireland's qualification hopes in light of the news from Switzerland.

The manager sent out a statement from Italy speaking in vaguely positive terms, praising the quality of France's individuals while expressing surprise they were in this situation in the first place having lost out on automatic qualification to Serbia.

His assistant Liam Brady was in Dublin, meanwhile, where he flirted around the topic of the reported unrest in the French camp under their eccentric boss Raymond Domenech. By praising the united nature of the Irish dressing room, he was essentially making a point. Brady also added that back in the day job at Arsenal, Arsene Wenger had pointed out some time ago that he believed Les Bleus would be in the playoffs rather than group winners.

The perpetual chaos under Domenech and the lop sided nature of France's strengths - towards attack rather than defence - have been seized upon by Irish optimists. The French, on the other hand, seem to believe that Ireland were an undesirable option from the four unseeded teams. With so many players on both sides being familiar with each other from the Premier League, a derby of sorts has been floated but Parisian observers may not be aware that Giovanni Trapattoni wants his team to operate in a completely different style to an English team even if it may not be immediately obvious to some.

Can Ireland do it? A cagey first leg is expected, and if they can keep a clean sheet in Dublin then they are capable of scoring in Paris but defensive frailties and problems with ball retention are unlikely to go away against a side with the pace to hurt them. [3.65] about Ireland to qualify doesn't look tempting at this moment.

Elsewhere, the other unseeded teams managed to secure away ties first so their challenge is keep the tie alive before returning to their own turf. The meeting of Portugal and Bosnia is intriguing and could provide an upset. Portugal's home form has been ropey, despite their fine end to the campaign, so if the Bosnians can keep it respectable in Lisbon then it could get very interesting in the Balkan state.

The Ukraine are now favourites to beat Greece, which emphasises why Ireland were so keen to draw the latter of the top seeds. Of course the irony is that, at [2.10] the Greeks are approaching value against a Ukrainian side who can be inconsistent.

Meanwhile, Russia will be hoping to get the job done in the first leg at home to an attacking Slovenia side. They are good enough to do so; much as it would be nice to see the outsiders striking a blow to FIFA's cynical late decision to seed this stage of the competition.

Early Best Bets:

Greece to qualify at [2.10]
Bosnia to qualify at [3.65]