After all the talk of mental toughness and the ‘never say die’ attitude, Scotland’s performance against Germany was woeful and an insult to the estimated 150,000-strong Tartan Army who have traveled to Germany.
Nobody really expected them to win against the hosts, but where was the fight that usually epitomizes the Scottish spirit?
They are going to have to come up with the goods in this match against a strong Switzerland side who were so impressive against Hungary on Saturday, and what a wonderful moment for Breel Embolo, who scored in injury time. We have been following his career closely and we were of the opinion that his international career was over after a devastating run of injuries.
It was certainly a ‘lump in the throat’ moment when he grabbed Switzerland’s third goal.
Odds and Predictions
Unless Steve Clarke, the Scotland manager, can pull off some kind of miracle, we can’t see any result other than a victory for Switzerland for our predictions.
Scotland were very lucky even scoring at all against Germany, a mistake resulting in an own goal was the only way they could get off the mark.
Even though Scotland has a few quality players, they just don’t have the strength in depth to compete in this competition, but if they can improve on their mental toughness and perhaps include Billy Gilmour from the start instead of bringing him on off the bench, we may see a different Scottish side turn up against the Swiss.
The odds for a Switzerland win is a very generous 1.85, so we will definitely be having some of that, as well as 0 – 3 correct score bet at odds of 15.0.
We also recommend a wager on John McGinn to be booked at odds of 3.0 as the last of our tips.
This is one Scottish player who will definitely be up for the challenge and as Aston Villa fans will confirm, McGinn can be a very aggressive player.
Comparison and Statistics from Past Meetings between the Teams
Scotland and Switzerland have faced each other H2H 16 times in their footballing history.
Scotland has won 8 of these encounters, Switzerland has won 5, and 3 matches have ended in a draw.
The last 5 head-to-head meetings are listed below.
| Past Meetings | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01 Mar 2006 | scotland | 0-1 | switzerland | Friendly Game |
| 18 Jun 1996 | scotland | 1-1 | switzerland | UEFA European Championship |
| 08 Sep 1993 | scotland | 2-2 | switzerland | FIFA World Cup Qualifier |
| 09 Sep 1992 | switzerland | 2-0 | scotland | FIFA World Cup Qualifier |
| 30 Mar 1983 | scotland | 0-3 | switzerland | UEFA European Championship |
Expected Line Ups
In our opinion, there are three players in the Scotland squad who must be up for it if Scotland are going to stand a chance in this match and those players are Scott McTominay, John McGinn and Andrew Robertson.
All Premier League players, they have definitely got the capabilities, so the Tartan Army must be praying that they can do the business and turn up on the night.
As for Switzerland, a repeat performance of their victory against Hungary and they will have nothing to worry about in this match.
Scotland (3-4-2-1): Angus Gunn; Anthony Ralston, Grant Hanley, Kieran Tierney; Ryan Porteous, Scott McTominay, John McGinn, Andrew Robertson; Ryan Christie, Billy Gilmour; Che Adams.
Switzerland (4-2-3-1): Yann Sommer; Silvan Widmer, Nico Elvedi, Manuel Akanji, Ricardo Rodríguez; Denis Zakaria, Granit Xhaka; Xherdan Shaqiri, Michel Aebischer, Ruben Vargas; Breel Embolo.
How Far Will These Teams Progress in the Tournament?
Scotland has nothing to lose in this match, but even if every player plays out of their skin, we still can’t see them getting out of the Group stage of the competition.
As for Switzerland, we still see them as one of the dark horses and a Quarter-final or even Semi-final place is still within their capabilities.
