Italy has to beat Northern Ireland then Wales or Bosnia to return to the World Cup

Italy’s head coach Gennaro Gattuso (AP Photo/Luca Bruno)

Italy will first host Northern Ireland in a World Cup qualifying playoff in March but then would go on the road to reach its first tournament after back-to-back failures at this stage.

FIFA made the playoffs draw today (Thursday) that will send the winner between four-time champion Italy and the Northern Irish on March 26 to travel to face Wales or Bosnia-Herzegovina five days later. At stake was a place at the first 48-team finals tournament in north America.

Italy has not played at a World Cup since 2014 and was pushed into the playoffs by finishing runner-up in a qualifying group won by Norway.

In other European playoff brackets, Ukraine will host Sweden with the winner then at home to Poland or Albania.

Kosovo’s path to a first ever World Cup as Europe’s newest soccer nation is away to Slovakia followed by hosting Turkey or Romania.

Ireland’s reward for remarkable back-to-back wins over Portugal and Hungary in the past week is a playoff semifinal at the Czech Republic with the winner then hosting Denmark or North Macedonia.

FIFA also made the draw for the six-nation intercontinental playoffs that do not involve Europe.

Iraq, which was seeded in the draw, will have to beat Bolivia or Suriname in a one-game playoff next March to qualify for the finals tournament co-hosted by the United States, Canada and Mexico.

Congo was seeded in the other intercontinental playoffs bracket and will play the winner of a single-game semifinal between New Caledonia and Jamaica.

The six intercontinental playoff games will be staged in Mexico from March 23-31 at stadiums in Guadalajara and Monterrey, which each will host four World Cup games next June.

A total of six teams will advance from the two sets of playoffs in March to complete the first 48-nation lineup.

The other 42 teams were confirmed this week when qualifying groups and playoff games were completed on four continents.

The World Cup draw is on Dec. 5 at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. There, the six unconfirmed playoffs teams will be drawn as placeholders and should come out of the pot of lowest-ranked teams in the seeded draw.

A penalty scored by Iraq in the 17th minute of stoppage time against the United Arab Emirates on Tuesday sent coach Graham Arnold’s team through to the global playoffs. Iraq’s 2-1 win in Basra sealed a 3-2 victory in the two-leg Asian playoff.

Iraq’s only World Cup appearance was in 1986, and Arnold coached his home nation Australia at the 2022 tournament in Qatar, reaching the round of 16.

New Caledonia is the lowest-ranked team in the playoffs, at No. 149 of the 211 FIFA member countries.

New Caledonia effectively advanced to the playoffs by beating Tahiti 3-0 in March, before losing the Oceania qualifying final against New Zealand. Coach Johann Sidaner’s team has played just one game since, beating Gibraltar in a friendly last month.

MDT/AP