Portugal will take on Austria in a group F fixture on Saturday in a must-win game for both the teams in Euro 2016. Neither side has registered a win so far with Portugal drawing their opener 1-1 against Iceland and Austria suffering a shock 2-0 defeat at the hands of Hungary. A loss for either of the two would hand over their fate into the hands of the other two teams of the group and severely dent their chances of qualifying for the knockout stages of the European Championship.
The group’s favourites Portugal were not clinical enough in their opening game, and even Cristiano Ronaldo could not inspire them to a victory against minnows Iceland. Portugal did attempt 26 shots against their opponents, 10 of which came from their superstar captain Ronaldo, but as has been the case with them throughout the qualifiers their inability to convert chances cost them a crucial two points.
Austria find themselves at the bottom of the table following their depressing performance against Hungary. Entering the tournament as one of the dark horses, Marcel Koller's team wasn't in shape and had a lot of tactical issues. They’ll desperately need to find their rhythm to have a chance of beating Ronaldo and company.
Live Streaming
The match will be live from 00:30 IST (Sunday), 20:00 BST (Saturday). Watch live streaming of the game on SonyLIV. Follow Portugal vs Austria, Euro 2016 Live Score and Commentary with Sportskeeda. The match will be telecasted live on Sony ESPN and Sony ESPN HD in India, Fox Sports in the USA and Premier Sports in the UK. The match will be played at Parc des Princes, Paris.
Team news
Austria will be without centre-back Aleksandar Dragovic, who is suspended following his red card in the last match. He could be replaced by Tottenham's Kevin Wimmer or Watford's Sebastian Prodl.
Playmaker Zlatko Junuzovic will also miss out due to an ankle problem which could mean Bayern Munich’s David Alaba is given an attacking midfield role.
Portugal coach Fernando Santos may rotate his squad with Renato Sanches, Ricardo Quaresma and Jose Fonte in contention to start. William Carvalho could replace defensive midfielder Danilo, who is nursing a back injury.
Probable Line-ups
Form guide (all games, most recent first)
Portugal: D-W-L-W-W
Austria: L-L-W-L-W
Head to Head
In their previous 10 meetings, the two teams have largely shared the exploits, Portugal and Austria winning twice and thrice respectively and drawing the rest. The 6 competitive encounters have produced two wins for each team and two draws. This is the first time that the two countries will be meeting at a major tournament.
Austria have won this encounter with the biggest margin, running rampage over Portugal in the 1954 World cup qualifier with a 9-1 victory. Their last win against the Portuguese came in 1979, when they beat them 2-1 in a European Championship qualifier in Lisbon. The last meeting in 1995 ended in a 1-1 draw.
Despite being favourites, Fernando Santos, while speaking to UEFA.com has hailed Austria as a tough team to beat: “Austria are a very strong team. It's not for nothing that they're in the top ten in the FIFA rankings. Over the last four or five years they have developed and the personnel has mainly stayed the same. They're strong in attack and have many players with great qualities and technical ability. They are very different to Iceland.”
Austria coach Koller has said that his team will perform better than against Hungary as they have learnt from their mistakes: “We have to play differently to how we did in the defeat by Hungary. We've analysed it and tried to learn from it, but we need to be more clinical with our chances, play more calmly and be more compact defensively. It's the little things that decide games at this level, and you have to do these little things better than your opponents.”
Match Prediction
As he has proved time and again, Cristiano Ronaldo almost always delivers when needed the most, and it’s now or never for Portugal. The match will be doubly special for the Real Madrid star as he is set to become Portugal’s most-capped player with a record 128th appearance for the team.
Austria will need to improve a lot on their previous performance and so will Portugal. But with Austria’s Dragovic also suspended, Portugal is likely to hit the Austrians hard.
Our prediction is that Portugal will win the game with a scoreline of 2-0.
