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Swedish manager Erik Hamrén on Tuesday named his 24 man squad for next month’s FIFA World Cup 2014 qualifiers against the Republic of Ireland at Aviva Stadium and their away game with Kazakhstan. The battle for a berth in Brazil is reaching its climax in Group C with four teams still in the hunt for qualification but with Germany clear favourites for securing the automatic spot available for topping the group.





Germany lead the group on 16 points and Sweden, along with Austria and Ireland, are trailing the unbeaten Germans by five points. On the night that Sweden play in Dublin, Austria travel to Munich to take on Germany. Four days later, Ireland face Austria in Vienna while Sweden travel to Astana. A draw in Dublin between Ireland and Sweden would allow Germany to qualify in early September if they can beat both Austria and the Faroe Islands.





Players to watch





There is real quality and experience throughout Swedish squad, right from A to Z and from the back to the front; Andreas Isaksson is their goalkeeper who plays his club football with Kasimpasa in Istanbul and has amassed 107 international caps for his national team. Zlatan Ibrahimovic needs little introduction with the Swedish captain having scored 44 international goals from 91 games during his time playing some of Europe’s biggest clubs (Ajax, Juventus, Internazionale, Barcelona, Milan and now Paris Saint-Germain).





Previous encounters with Ireland





Giovanni Trapattoni and his team will take heart from Ireland’s determined 0-0 draw in Stockholm earlier in the campaign when Ireland kept the talismanic Zlatan quiet; something that Norway couldn’t do against Sweden recently on the same night that Ireland played out a dour draw in Cardiff. Ibrahimovic was the inspiration behind Sweden’s 4-2 August friendly win over the Norwegians, with the striker scoring a hat-trick.





In competative matches, the Boys in Green have yet to get a victory over the Blagult (Blue and Gold). In addition to that drawn game between the sides in Stockholm last March, in the 1970 European Championship qualifiers Ireland earned a 1-1 home draw but lost 1-0 away. In 1949, Sweden beat Ireland 3-1 both home and away. Ireland do have two wins over the Swedes but both were in Friendly internationals played at the old Lansdowne Road. In 1999 Ireland won 2-0 in Dublin, while in Steve Staunton’s first game in charge in 2006, Ireland earned a 3-0 win over Sweden.





Sweden Squad in full





Andreas Isaksson (Kasimpasa), Kristoffer Nordfeldt (Heerenveen), Johan Wiland (Copenhagen), Mikael Antonsson (Bologna), Pierre Bengtsson (Copenhagen), Rasmus Bengtsson (FC Twente), Andreas Granqvist* (Krasnodar), Adam Johansson (IFK Göteborg), Mikael Lustig (Celtic), Per Nilsson (Nürnberg), Jonas Olsson (West Brom), Martin Olsson (Norwich City), Jimmy Durmaz (Genclerbirligi), Albin Ekdal (Cagliari), Johan Elmander (Norwich City), Tobias Hysén (IFK Göteborg), Zlatan Ibrahimovic (PSG), Alexander Kacaniklic (Spartak Moscow), Sebastian Larsson (Sunderland), Anders Svensson (Elfsborg), Ola Toivonen (PSV Eindhoven), Pontus Wernbloom (CSKA Moscow), Erkan Zengin (Eskisehirspor).

*suspended for game against Ireland