Sport: Armenia soccer youths in mature play against Estonia, Ireland

A Danish coach’s Armenia provided a surprisingly positive finish to an otherwise failed soccer season as they battled bravely and successfully against visiting Estonia and Ireland. Flemming Serritslev’s Under-21 charges were a whisker away from scoring a deserved victory over Estonian coevals in the Saturday game at Republican Stadium, but after scoring once and missing a lot of good chances to materialize their advantage on the pitch they conceded a goal in stoppage time and had to settle for a 1-1 draw. Armenia’s junior team looked mighty three days later against Ireland. In that game, Serritslev’s youngsters scored their first victory in the current campaign 4-1, with Henrik Mkhitaryan managing a hat-trick. Thus, with four points (in six games) Armenia has managed to unseat Ireland from the fifth spot in the six-nation qualifying group that also includes Switzerland, Turkey and Georgia. 

Armeniaa next travel to Ireland for the second leg in early March. Meanwhile, European soccer’s governing body, UEFA, has announced the composition of six pools of nations for the Euro-2012 qualifying stage draw that will take place on February 7 to form nine qualifying groups. Armenia is in the fifth pool, along with Montenegro, Albania, Estonia, Georgia, Moldova, Iceland, Kazakhstan and Lichtenstein. Azerbaijan is put in the last sixth pool. (Source:armenianow.com