The opening match of Group D revealed a lot. We have the Croatians with an overview, how we will defend Foden remains a mystery

On Sunday, the opening game of the most watched Group D match between England and Croatia took place. Both future opponents of the Czech team revealed their weapons and weaknesses, which they came to the Euro with, and we will discuss them.

Croatia

There are high expectations for Croatia, especially because of the fantastic World Cup in Russia. As such, most fans were undoubtedly disappointed by the performance in the opening game of the championship, with an experienced line-up failing to match England in a single aspect of the game.

The team entered the game with virtually three defensive midfielders, as all of the trio of Kovačić – Brozović – Modrić did not move forward much and rather formed a seven-man defensive line with the backline.

Older players like Brozovic were absolutely not up to speed and after the English, led by the famed Phillips, dominated the midfield, there was nothing to talk about. It is this discipline that should be decisive in Friday’s game.

Given the variability of the three midfielders likely to start, Soucek, Kral and Darida, Jaroslav Šilhavy’s selection could dominate this part of the field and decide the match in their favour. Moreover, the form of 2018 Ballon d’Or winner Luka Modrić is not dazzling either.

On the other hand, the performance of the provisional left-back Josko Guardiola, only 19 years old, was a positive. He could prevent Adam Hložek from starting with his offensive activity, similar to how it will probably turn out against Robertson, as he too will need a steady hand to be held over him by Lukas Masopust.

We certainly have no easy task ahead of us on Friday, but the Croatian performance against England certainly gives us hope of a three-point success. However, we still have to take into account the quality of the cubes they were up against.

England

Gareth Southagate’s side managed to dominate the opening game at the Euro for the first time in their history and after a convincing performance as another favourite, they certainly didn’t fall short of expectations.

As the song It’s Coming Home is now playing on the streets of London, the thought of how we will cope with Albion ‘s attacking threats is on the minds of the Czech national team.

From my point of view, the worst position is not the stopper, but the left-back. Because if Foden comes in on the right wing again, it would be bad.

Just remember the trouble that Bukayo Saka gave Jan Boril in the Europa League, who is only half as good at quick dribbling as the generational talent Phil Foden.

If the Rice-Phillips pairing, who have been a well-matched duo for several years, had a similar match, a point from this game would have been more of a miracle for us.

We can look for the positives of the positive performance of the English team in the gain of points for the Czech national team, because if they had won against Scotland there would have been practically nothing to play for in the last match and because of the extremely wide squad it would probably have been necessary to lose the starting line-up somewhat.

Source: Livesport