Werder players strong internationally

The long, rocky road to the 2014 World Cup in Brazil has begun. The first World Cup qualifiers kicked off on Friday. Sokratis and Kevin De Bruyne were two Bremen players who played for their national teams and performed well.

Werder defensive boss Sokratis started the qualification successful with a 2-1 victory for Greece in Latvia, defending for the full 90 minutes. Alongside the 24-year-old Sokratis, who had a good showing, was his Bundesliga colleague Kyriakos Papadopoulos from Schalke. Sokratis and his teammates will next play Lithuania in Group G of the qualification on Tuesday 11 September 2012 at 8:45 p.m.

Another successful Werder player was De Bruyne, who was subbed in after 64 minutes in Belgium's 2-0 victory over Wales in the opening match in Group A. De Bruyne brought some energy to the Belgium attack. Head coach Marc Wilmots' Belgians next face off with Croatia three days later with their sights set on Brazil.

The Turkish national team as expected had a tough qualification beginning, losing 2-0 to World Cup runners-up Netherlands. Bremen's Mehmet Ekici did not play in the game but hopes to play in the second qualifier against Estonia in Istanbul.

Both Saturday qualifiers have Bremen participation. Leftback Aleksandar Ignovski and Serbia take on Scotland at 4 p.m. while Theo Gebre Selassie and Czech Republic play Denmark at 8:15 p.m. The Austrians and the Werder trio Marko Arnautovic, Zlatko Junuzovic and Sebastian Prödl face Germany on Tuesday in Vienna.

Not playing World Cup qualification but still in national team dress on Thursday was Francois Affolter with the Swiss U21 team. The leftback played the entire 90 minutes in Switzerland's 0-0 draw with Spain. In the qualification for the U21 European Championship, Switzerland are missing just three points from their game against Estonia on Monday to move into the playoffs.