Hard to emphasize exactly how important these two legged matches are for the teams involved, go through and you can book your flight to Brazil for next Summer, lose and you will be watching on television. A massive incentive for both, but football in New Zealand is considered a poor third to both Rugby Union and Cricket and if the Kiwis do not make it to Brazil, it will be news for one day and deep down, few will actually expect their team to beat the Mexicans over two legs.

Tuesday November 12th

Tomorrow looks far and away the most interesting day of the midweek, at least in terms of quality of fixtures,with a full round in Brazil getting underway, I also want to take a look at the DP World Tour Championship golf and one other event and might have to split things over two emails, but will update that in the morning, as usual the next newsletter is due at 10.00 UK time on Wednesday.

Two teams we have discussed a lot this season. The Lions are a club I have always had a bit of a soft spot for (yes I am a little odd) and they did us a favour last week in that home draw with league leaders Burnley, but as we discussed at the time, that is typical Millwall, raising their game against the big clubs at the New Den. On the road they are not quite so imposing and ahead of their trip to Bournemouth early last month I wrote ....

City won the reverse fixture 2-1, coming from behind, courtesy of two Sergio Aguero goals, the match was played on a terrible playing surface which the English club and coach Manuel Pellegrini were clearly unhappy with and were perhaps fortunate to come away with all three points, keeper Joe Hart coming to their rescue deep in stoppage time, with a hugely important save. Another three points for City tonight would secure progression from this group, provided Bayern did not lose at Plzen and that would mean they could focus fully on the Premier League for the next three months, so, very valuable.

Very busy day for clubgowi today, five football and three NFL selections and you can read one of those eight previews below. It is probably the least interesting and definitely the smallest stake football preview, but is free ( subscribers have had to pay a massive 2.7 euros for the other seven previews !) and better than nothing.

Championship: Millwall - Burnley

Five selections for subscribers to the clubgowi newsletter today and you can read one of those match previews below.

Inter have performed really well in these midweek Serie A fixtures, winning five of the last six, with the loss coming in what was really a meaningless fixture for them. This match is far from that and already four points off Champions League pace, they need a maximum return to put pressure on the top three, who play later in midweek.

Things can chage quickly in this league, a fortnight ago I wrote this ... I expect a big showing from Goias today, they are coming off a road win at Portuguesa, but had not won in three previously, including two at home and will want the safety cushion that three points will give them today, with two of their next three on the road and their next two home games looking far more difficult on paper.