Germany forward Miroslav Klose scored his 50th international goal and seventh in his last seven games to clinch top spot in Group 4 for his team.

Although defender Jerome Boateng was sent off for a second yellow card in the 68th minute, the Germans held on for a victory in Moscow that gives them an unassailable four-point lead.

"We prepared the team in such a way that we said: 'We have our hand on the ticket to South Africa, we can decide it ourselves if we win here' - and the team put that into effect very well," Germany coach Joachim Loew said.

"We said from the start that we wanted to play for a win here, and so go forward. Of course, we had a bit of luck in some situations, one has to say that."

The Russians have the consolation of the runners-up spot and a likely place in the two-legged play-offs.

"We cannot be happy about the result but, about the attacking way we played, you can be satisfied," Russia coach Guus Hiddink said.

The Dutchman was confident Russia would win their play-off.

"If we play as we have in this and recent qualifying games, we are of course favourites," he said.

qualifying

England had already joined the Netherlands and Spain in reaching next year's tournament from European qualifying, but hoped to go to South Africa after winning all 10 group games.

That run ended after a deflected 29th-minute strike by Serhiy Nazarenko from 20 metres beat substitute goalkeeper David James.

Ukraine's Andriy Shevchenko had earlier hit a penalty against the post after goalkeeper Robert Green had been sent off.

Ukraine's victory means they climbed above Croatia into second place in Group 6. The eight best runners-up in the nine groups will go into the play-offs, with second-place Norway in Group 9 expected to miss out.

Switzerland stood on the verge of qualifying after a 3-0 victory over Luxembourg helped by two early headed goals by Phillipe Senderos.

European champions Spain made it nine wins out of nine with a 2-1 victory in Armenia, fielding largely a backup team. A first-half goal by Cesc Fabregas and a second-half penalty by Juan Mata captured three more points for the Spaniards.

Bosnia-Herzegovina, which have never played in the World Cup, guaranteed second place in Group 5 with a 2-0 victory at Estonia after goals by Edin Dzeko and Vedad Ibisevic.