England will be hosting Portugal this Thursday, June 2nd at Wembley Stadium in London as both teams prepare themselves for the upcoming Euro 2016 tournament which kicks off in France on June 10th. The English Premier League came to an end just over two weeks ago and England has since picked up 2-1 home wins over Turkey and Australia in their warm-up matches for the European Championships. Portugal finally has its full squad together after last Saturday’s European Champions League Final which saw Real Madrid down their cross-town rivals Atletico Madrid 5-3 in a shootout after playing to a 1-1 draw. Portuguese captain Cristiano Ronaldo sealed the victory with the winning penalty kick.
England vs Portugal – Pinnacle Sports Soccer Betting Line:
- Pinnacle Sports currently lists England as the favorites at +130 with Portugal +251 and a draw at +227
England vs Portugal – Head to Head:
- The teams met at the 2004 European Championships in Portugal with the host nation beating the Three Lions via a penalty shootout. They also met again at the World Cup in 2006 in the quarterfinals with Portugal winning once again in a shootout after England’s Wayne Rooney was sent off earlier in the match. Overall, the two sides have met 22 times in the past with England winning nine, losing five and drawing the other eight. The last four meetings have ended in draws after 90 minutes and eight of the last 11 have been draws. England has just one win in their past 11 encounters which was 3-0 at home in April of 1998. England has only three victories in the 13 games since 1966, when they managed to win the World Cup.
As usual, England struggled in their last major tournament, which was the 2014 World Cup in Brazil. However, they went 10-0 in Euro 2016 qualifying and have 16 wins, two draws, and two losses since the last World Cup. England was the only nation to win every one of their 10 qualifying games for the European championships and they allowed just three goals against in those contests. The team has 18 victories along with three draws and four defeats in their past 25 home outings since 2008. Those four losses came at the hands of Chile, Holland, France and Germany. England enters the game ranked number 10 in the world by FIFA while Portugal is ranked eighth.
There’s no doubt that England has a lot of offensive talent in Harry Kane (Tottenham Hotspur), Jamie Vardy (Leicester City), Daniel Sturridge (Liverpool), Wayne Rooney (Manchester United), Marcus Rashford (Manchester United), Dele Alli (Tottenham Hotspur) and Ross Barkley (Everton), but the squad looks to be a bit fragile defensively and goaltender Joe Hart (Manchester City) never looks quite sure of himself. Kane led the Premier League with 25 goals this season while Vardy came in right behind him in second place with 24 goals.
Portugal managed to win seven of their Euro 2016 qualifying matches with four of them being 1-0 results. It seems if Ronaldo is being closely marked then the squad has a difficult time finding the back of the net and Nani and Eder will need to help out in the goalscoring department. Portugal has three victories and two defeats in their past five encounters with 1-0 losses at the hands of Bulgaria and Russia. However, they’ve won two in a row against Norway and Belgium. The starting lineups for this match will be unpredictable and Portugal could very well rest Ronaldo. England manager Roy Hodgson recently cut Fabian Delph, Danny Drinkwater, and Andros Townsend when he announced his final 23-man roster.