Having booked their place in this summer’s UEFA Nations League Finals, England kick off their UEFA Euro 2020 qualifying campaign against Czech Republic at Wembley Stadium.
Team news
Embed from Getty ImagesEngland will be without a host of regulars including Trent Alexander-Arnold, who pulled out with a back injury.
John Stones (groin), Luke Shaw (knock), Fabian Delph (knock), Ruben Loftus-Cheek (back) and Marcus Rashford (ankle) are also ruled out for this round of international fixtures.
Their absence therefore means that James Ward-Prowse and Callum Hudson-Odoi have been called up into the senior squad.
Czech Republic will be without goalkeeper Tomas Vaclik due to an abdominal muscle injury.
Captain, Borek Dockal is a doubt with a calf injury but could recover to feature in attacking midfield.
Stat Attack
- England are yet to lose to Czech Republic but this is the first competitive meeting between both teams (W1, D1).
- England are on a 39 match qualifier winning run across both World Cup and Euros since losing 1-0 to Ukraine in October 2009 (W28, D11).
- Czech Republic have won three of their last four in which Patrik Schick has scored, only losing to Ukraine in September in their opening Nations League clash.
- Under Gareth Southgate. England’s only home loss came against Spain in September (W10, D4, L1).
- England are unbeaten in 12 competitive fixtures this century held during March (W10, D2).
Prediction
Czech Republic do have decent players who can cause issues when attacking but this is a solid all round England side, who will be difficult to stop despite various absentees.
I therefore am going for a comfortable home win here because this youthful Three Lions are definitely roaring with talent, which will be too much for the Czech’s defence to handle.
Prediction: England 2-0 Czech Republic
Result: England 5-0 Czech Republic