Croatia, 3; English Retailers, -$1.2B

Its not just English soccer fans who will be gloomily slumped over their pint glass after a loss against Croatia in a qualifying match took the English team out of the Euro 2008, the quadrennial European championship. The humiliating defeat, which led to the firing of Steve McClaren as England's coach, will cost British retailers an estimated £600 million ($1.2 billion).

The figure, estimated by the British Retail Consortium, may be a fraction of the £250 billion ($516.0 billion) brought in by the entire retail sector, but the loss of sales could put a pinch on many businesses that were hoping that sales related to England games could give their 2008 earnings a lift.

The first in the line of fire are sports retailers, for whom sales of replica England shirts, soccer balls, and other sporting equipment will be far lower than they would have been had the country qualified for the European championship, Richard Dodd a spokesman for the British Retail Consortium told Forbes.com.

Sports Direct, controlled by British billionaire Mike Ashley 's Sports International issued a profit warning, and its shares slumped 16.0%, to 94.50 pence ($1.95), in morning trading in London. "As England have not qualified for the 2008 European Football Championships, the company can no longer be confident of achieving that level of financial performance and believes at this stage that pre-exceptional earnings before tax for the current financial year is likely to be below that achieved in the last year," said the company on Thursday.

Shares in Umbro (other-otc: UMBOF - news - people ), which also acknowledged that its sales of replica England shirts would be severely hit, slumped by 3.7%, to 168 pence ($3.47), in midday trading in London. Citibank analyst James Targett cut his earnings per share forecasts for 2007 and 2008 by 10% and 19%, respectively. However Umbro was saved from a complete battering, as analysts remain confident that the takeover by Nike (nyse: NKE - news - people ) will go ahead regardless. "England qualification looked unlikely when Nike entered negotiations, so we believe this outcome is unlikely to derail the offer," wrote Targett in a note to investors. However he added that now it was highly unlikely that Nike would raise its offer to deter a possible counterbid by Ashley. (See: " Is Mike Ashley Preparing To Bargain With Nike? ")

Another sports retailer JJB Sports (other-otc: JJBSF - news - people ) hasn't yet issued a profits warning but its shares fell by 3.3%, to 141 pence ($2.91).

The British Retail Consortium's Dodd said that England's disqualification would also have an impact - albeit a much less significant one - on the sales of supermarkets, as well as television and electronic goods retailers, and pubs and clubs. The news had little impact on shares in the sector. Leading pub chain J D Weatherspoon rose by 3.9%, to 405 pence ($8.36) in London, while supermarket J. Sainsbury (other-otc: JSAIY - news - people ) ticked up 0.5%, to 410 pence ($8.46) and Tesco (other-otc: TSCDY - news - people ) gained 0.8%, to 467 pence ($9.64).