Czech Republic will take on bottom placed Turkey in a Group D match on Tuesday in Euro 2016. While the Czechs will need all three points to have a chance to qualify for the knockout stages, Turkey will need results from other also to go in their favour if they are to advance any further. A win will take the Turks to third spot with three points, but qualification may still be a little out of reach owing to their goal difference.
Both the teams lie in the bottom half of the table with Czech at third with one point and Turkey rock-bottom yet to open their account. The Czech Republic suffered a narrow 1-0 defeat to Spain in their opening match, the goal coming through Gerard Pique’s header just three minutes before time. They seemed to be heading to a consecutive defeat against the Croatians having gone two goals down, but showed their character by scoring two in the last 15 minutes to clinch an important point.
A win would see Pavel Vrba’s men finish with four points but all will go in vain if Spain are unable to defeat Croatia. If Croatia however, lose coupled with Czech win, the two teams will be tied at four points, bringing goal difference into account. Czech Republic’s goal difference going into the last matchday is -1 whereas Croatia’s is +1.
Turkey, on the other hand, lost both their previous matches of the group to Croatia and Spain. They gave an underwhelming performance in their opening 1-0 defeat to Croatia which worsened in a 3-0 thrashing at the hands of the defending champions. Even if they finish third, they are unlikely to make the cut of the best four of the third placed teams owing to their -4 goal difference.
Live Streaming
The match will be live from 00:30 IST (Wednesday), 20:00 BST (Tuesday). Watch live streaming of the game on SonyLIV, Fox Soccer2go or Premier Player. Follow Czech Republic vs Turkey, Euro 2016 Live Score and commentary at 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 fixture will be played at Stade Bollaert-Delelis, Lens.
Team News
Czech Republic suffered a huge setback during the weekend as captain Tomas Rosicky was ruled out of playing against Turkey. The former Arsenal star picked up a thigh injury in their remarkable comeback against Croatia in their last match. Though the midfielder will stay in France to support his team, his absence from the field will be a huge blow to the Czechs.
Other than the exception of Rosicky, Pavel Vrba has a fully fit squad to chose his starting XI from. There are slight suspension worries though, with David Limbersky and Tomas Sivok just one yellow away from a ban.
Turkey’s Nuri Sahin is a slight doubt for the match after having picked up a knock to his knee during training. Fatih Terim will otherwise have a full roster to choose his eleven from. They have Burak Yilmaz, Cenk Tosun, Hakan Balta, Ozan Tufan and Volkan Sen risking suspension but with only a win on their minds, this should not be of much concern to the coach.
Probable Line-ups
Czech Republic: Cech; Kaderabek, Sivok, Hubnik, Limbersky; Darida, Pavelka; Skalak, Dockal, Krejci; Necid
Turkey: Babacan; Gonul, Topal, Balta, Erkin; Tufan, Inan, Ozyakup; Calhanoglu, Tosun, Turan
Form guide (all competitions, most recent first)
Czech Republic: DLLWW
Turkey: LLWWL
Head to Head
This match will mark the 20th meeting between the two sides. Czech Republic have historically been on top of this fixture, winning 12 of the last 19 games while Turkey have managed to emerge victorious only on 4 occasions.
This will also be the sides’ second meeting at a major tournament, with Turkey winning the previous encounter 3-2 at Euro 2018, staging a remarkable comeback to score three goals in the last 20 minutes of the game. That result saw Turkey advance through to the knockout stages at the expense of Czech Republic. The teams also met in the Euro 2016 qualifiers with each side sharing a win apiece.
The last nine encounters between the Czechs and Turkey have seen 31 goals scored, with at least two goals being scored in each one of those nine fixtures. The fact that the Czechs have scored in 12 of their last 13 games in the European Championships coupled with Turkey’s failure to keep a clean sheet at the tournament since 2000 shows the mammoth task lying in front of the Turks.
Turkey's coach Terim had some encouraging words to say to his players before the match in a press conference: “Our motto is, ‘It's not over until we say it's over.’ Now it's time to deliver. Sometimes things do not go your way in football, but hopefully we can get out of this crisis and start talking about different things.”
Match Prediction
Turkey have failed to impress so far and were very disappointing in the 3-0 defeat to Spain. Players like Arda Turan and Hakan Calhanoglu have been unable to deliver on what was expected from them before the start of Euro 2016. Czech Republic too have been dormant in their campaign but the last gasp comeback against Croatia will have gone a long way to provide the team with the momentum they have been looking for.
Our prediction is that Czech Republic will win the match with a scoreline of 1-0.
