After eights days of frenetic action with not a 0-0 in sight, Euro 2012 moves onto the final matchday of the group stages today. By Tuesday night the Quarter-Final line up will be complete and eight teams will be eliminated from the competition. It’s Group A that gets sorted out today and the key fixture is this match between Czech Republic and Poland.
After their fine 2-1 win over Greece on Tuesday it’s the Czech Republic who hold a one point advantage over Poland in the race to the Quarter-Finals and a draw should be enough for the Czechs to go through tonight. Poland must win to stay in the competition and anything less would be a massive disappointment to their fans.
Poland have impressed us so far. They should have won the opening match against Greece and would of had the pressure not got to them. But it was their fine come-from-behind draw against Russia that really made us sit up and take notice. The Czech’s were much improved against Greece but the feeling is that the Greeks are clearly the worst team in Group A. On top of this they were only 15 shots in the match – the lowest in a Euros game since 1980.
Taking all that into account, and the fact that Poland have a rousing home support in Wroclaw, preference is for the hosts to get the job done. This fixture has nearly always gone the way of the home side and we expect that to continue today so back Poland to beat Czech Republic at 13/10 today with Paddy Power.
Key Facts
- Poland must win to stay in the competition
- The five previous matches between the sides all ended in home wins
- The Czech Republic v Greece game (15) produced the lowest number of shots in a Euros game since 1980.
