Ireland draw France in World Cup playoff
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By Alistair Potter.
The Republic of Ireland will play France in a two-legged playoff to decide who qualifies for next summer's World Cup finals.
The draw for the last stage of the European qualifying campaign has been made at Fifa headquarters in Zurich, pairing Geovanni Trappattoni's team with the French - who finished runners-up behind Serbia in group seven of the European qualifying section for next summer's finals in South Africa.
Ireland, who will play in Dublin first, could have faced Portugal, Russia or Greece, who were all seeded in the draw.
The other ties see the Portuguese - who only just scraped into the playoffs courtesy of a win over Malta in their final qualifier - paired with the lowest-ranked side in the draw, Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Euro 2004 winners Greece will face Ukraine, runners-up in England's qualifying group, while Russia take on Slovenia for the 13th and final qualifying place from Europe for the 2010 World Cup.
The ties will take place on Saturday November 14th and November 18th with the winners entered into the draw for the group stage of the World Cup finals on December 4th.
Full draw for World Cup qualifying playoffs, Europe:
Repulic of Ireland v France
Portugal v Bosnia-Herzegovina
Greece v Ukraine
Russia v Slovenia