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Two of the highest-ranked nations in the world battle on Monday as France play Belgium in the first knockout stage of Euro 2024.
Neither side were convincing in the group stage, but France qualified after finishing second in Group D, while Belgium finished second in Group D.
France current form
Despite having an embarrassment of riches in the final third, France only scored two goals in the group stage – and one of them was an own-goal from Austria’s Maximilian Wober in the first game as Les Bleus earned a 1-0 victory.
France followed that win with two forgettable draws against the Netherlands and Poland.
Probably the most eventful thing that happened to them in the group stage was Kylian Mbappe breaking his nose in the first game. Thankfully for France and the player, he was able to return to feature in the tournament wearing a protective mask.
Belgium current form
Like France, Belgium were poor in the group stage despite qualifying.
They started their Euro 2024 campaign with defeat against Slovakia, only to bounce back with a comfortable 2-0 defeat of Romania.
In their last group game, they were booed by their own fans as they could only manage a 0-0 draw versus Ukraine. Romelu Lukaku hasn’t scored so far, but has been unlucky to see three goals disallowed.
There are no fresh injury concerns for Didier Deschamps following the draw against Poland. There were obvious worries surrounding Mbappe after the first game but he played the whole 90 minutes versus the Poles and even score, so he is fine after his nose break.
Antoine Griezmann was rested or dropped, depending on your perspective, for the Poland draw, but he should be reinstated here, perhaps at the expense of Bradley Barcola.
Deschamps has a full squad available at his disposal.
Axel Witsel and Thomas Meunier haven’t played a minute of the tournament so far and won’t play any part in this game either, so Domenico Tedesco will field the same back four that started against Ukraine.
He has decisions to make on the…
Source link : https://www.footballcritic.com/news/france-vs-belgium-euro-2024-round-of-16-prediction-team-to-win-form-news-and-more/5222
Author : [email protected] (Martin Macdonald)
Publish date : 2024-07-01 05:15:00
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