Anyone underestimating Champions League debutants CFR Cluj will now have to think again after the Romanians beat AS Roma 2-1 away in their Group A opener.

Having a smaller club make an impact is great for the competition after years of domination by the big sides. BATE Borisov of Belarus and Denmark’s Aalborg are two other little-known teams in this season’s group stages and they can only be spurred on by Cluj’s heroics in Rome.

Can any of these three sides make it through to the knockout stages? If Valencia, Bayer Leverkusen and Monaco made the final some years back then why can’t an even smaller side reach the last 16?

Zenit St Petersburg, once unheard of in European circles, are UEFA Cup and Super Cup champions remember.

Roma will struggle to beat Cluj away given their stuttering form and no side, not even Real Madrid, will fancy the trip to Belarus.

I’d love to think the gap between the haves and the have-nots is getting smaller. But it might just be a one-off. Cluj host rampaging Chelsea next.

PHOTO: CFR Cluj’s Juan Culio (C) celebrates with his team mates Yssouf Kone (L) and Sebastian Dubarbier after scoring against AS Roma during their Champions League Group A soccer match at the Olympic stadium in Rome September 16, 2008. REUTERS/Tony Gentile

Having been drawn alongside Italy, France and the Netherlands in Group C, not many people would have predicted Romania would hold their own destiny and that of the world champions and World Cup finalists in their own hands going into the final group matches.

But my Reuters colleagues at Euro 2008 and friends back in Brussels — who are not laughing at me now –  will testify that I was one of the few to tip the eastern Europeans as the dark horses to progress from the toughest group at the tournament.

Victory for Romania over the Netherlands on Tuesday would secure a quarter-final spot for Victor Piturca’s side, no matter what the result is between Italy and France. A draw in both games would also see the Romanians through and there are lots of other permutations, too many to explain here.

Any team that finished above the Dutch in qualification, beating them at home and drawing in Rotterdam, had to be taken seriously. Romania in fact lost just one game en route to Austria and Switzerland. A record any top team would be proud of.

Did France and Italy take them seriously enough in their two draws?

They are not the prettiest of teams to watch at Euro 2008, but if you could package them up, they certainly would do what is said on the tin. Very well organized, hold their shape, and very disciplined. In Adrian Mutu they have a match winner and captain Cristian Chivu can control and run a game from midfield at any level.

But they are not in the quarter-finals yet and face the daunting task of a rampant Dutch team. Will Romania regret the penalty miss from Mutu that would have all but sealed their passage to the last eight? Or will they be helped by the already qualified Dutch resting a few key players?

Marco Van Basten has promised to go all out for a win. But surely meeting Romania again in the semi-finals is a much more attractive proposition than playing Italy or France.

PHOTO: Romania’s Razvan Rat leaves the pitch with a bloodied face at half-time in the match against Italy in Zurich, June 13, 2008. REUTERS/Ruben Sprich

Football is a simple game so why do UEFA make the Euro 2008 groups so complicated?

The criteria for determining the rankings of teams who finish level on points are mindboggling.

Head to heads, mini-leagues of three teams, UEFA coefficents, fair play, drawing lots and even penalties after 90 minutes are all there. Plain old simple goal difference among every team in the group is only halfway down the list in terms of priority.

Goal difference among all teams is used in most domestic leagues in the world and fans all understand it.

So why is it less important than head-to-head records in big tournaments?

Why should Romania be penalised if they concede fewer goals against Group C winners Netherlands than Italy and France did? 

Just because they didn’t score a goal against France, they will go out if they lose to the Dutch on Tuesday and Italy grab a scoring draw with the French. 

Penalties to separate tied teams in the last group matches is a fun innovation when goal difference can’t help. Otherwise goal difference from all group matches is the fairest and easiest method.

I hope Michel Platini is reading.

PHOTO: Adrian Mutu gestures during a Romania training session, St Gallen, June 14, 2008. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann

The Bundesliga gets a bad rap at times. German clubs have for the most part failed to reach the latter stages of the Champions League in recent years, matches can sometimes seem to move in slow-motion and the officiating can be uneven or even downright scandalous (see Hoyzer, Robert).

But despite all that, Bundesliga players have been sparkling in Euro 2008. And with players from the German league on 15 of the 16 teams no league is more widely represented.
 
There have been players from the German domestic league in the starting line-ups of almost all the teams that have played of the tournament. Only Spain have no Bundesliga players in their squad.

And many are making a mark — from Franck Ribery of France to the Netherlands’ Rafael van der Vaart and Croatia’s Josip Simunic. Even the first goal of the tournament was scored by a player who cut his teeth in the Bundesliga — Vaclav Sverkos of the Czech Republic, who spent 2003 to 2007 at Borussia Moenchengladbach and Hertha Berlin.

After watching so many Bundesliga players popping up in post-match TV interviews and speaking their lightly accented German, I had a hunch the Bundesliga was probably the most represented of all domestic leagues at the Euro. And so it is, at least according to the Bundesliga’s website, which says there are 65 players on 15 teams at the Euro, comfortably beating the Premier League (44), the Primera Liga (43) and Serie A (38).
 
Here are a few possible explanations why:
 
German clubs — lacking the deep pockets of their rivals in England, Spain and Italy — have long been especially open to young (i.e. inexpensive) talent from Eastern European and Southeastern European countries, where bargains can be found. Secondly, Germany has large groups of immigrants from many countries in Eastern and Southeastern Europe and some of the best players for Turkey, Croatia and Greece, for example, grew up in ethnic communities in Germany and play in the Bundesliga.
 
Another factor contributing to the international feeling of the Bundesliga is that some clubs in the heart of Europe seem to go out of their way to bring together a nucleus of internationals from one country or another. Bayern Munich have their French connection in Ribery and Willy Sagnol. Hamburg SV have a Netherlands trio — Van der Vaart, Nigel de Jong and Joris Mathijsen. Nuremberg are filled with players from the neighbouring Czech Republic and Eintracht Frankfurt have a big Greece contingent in Sotiris Kyrgiakos, Ioannis Amanatidis, and Fanis Gekas.

Please go ahead and keep sniggering about the Bundesliga. But you have to admit — Bundesliga players are ueber alles. Aren’t they?

PHOTO: Franck Ribery sits on the pitch during France’s Group C match against Romania at the Letzigrund Stadium in Zurich, June 9, 2008. REUTERS/Charles Platiau