England kick-off their final Euro 2020 preparations with a friendly at home to Austria.
Gareth Southgate’s side are ranked fourth in the world, behind only Belgium and France – both of whom will be expected to challenge for honours over the next six weeks – and Brazil.
Opponents Austria, who are also concentrating on fine-tuning plans for this summer’s tournament which was postponed from a year ago, are 19 places below having qualified for two of the last three European Championships but have yet to get past the group stage.
Unsurprisingly England are odds-on for victory at 1/2, with Austria 6/1 and the draw 3/1.
Here we take a look at some England v Austria betting tips.
Match odds
England are joint-favourites to win Euro 2020, influenced by the fact they will play all three group matches at Wembley, and should they win Group D they will have a last-16 tie at home while, further down the line, both the semi-finals and final will be hosted at Wembley.
It is also backed up by Southgate’s side record as they have lost just twice – against Belgium and Denmark – in the last 14 internationals, scoring 39 times.
Austria have only failed to score once in their last 11 fixtures, last time out against Denmark, so England to win and both teams to score is priced at 5/2 while over 3.5 goals, England to win and both teams to score is 4/1.
While the quality of opposition has varied (facing the likes of San Marino, Montenegro and Kosovo) Southgate’s side have kept 11 clean sheets over this period and England to win both halves, England over 2.5 goals and England to keep a clean sheet is 7/1.
England v Austria head-to-head
There have been 18 meetings over a 113-year period, the last coming in 2007 when Peter Crouch scored the only goal with a header.
However, the match was memorable for a thigh injury to Michael Owen which ruled him out of the crucial Euro 2008 qualifier against Croatia where defeat and failure to make the tournament cost manager Steve McClaren his job.
That was the 10th victory against Austria, with the last of their four defeats back in 1979.
Austria: A Schlager, Ulmer, Dragovic, Trauner, Alaba, Lainer, Ilsanker, Sabitzer, Baumgartner, X Schlager, Kalajdzic.
Key battles
Goalkeeper Daniel Bachmann is the only member of the Austria squad currently playing in England, having been a key part of Watford’s promotion back to the Premier League.
But there are number of familiar names, including Bayern Munich’s Real Madrid-bound David Alaba and RB Leipzig’s Marcel Sabitzer.
Former Stoke and West Ham striker Marko Arnautovic has 26 goals in 87 appearances and he needs just three more to move into third on Austria’s all-time leading scorers list.
However, he has not scored since June 2019, having drawn a blank in his last five matches, and is playing second fiddle to Stuttgart’s 23-year-old Sasa Kalajdzic, who has three goals in his first five international appearances.
Arnautovic is 3/1 to score any time, with Kalajdzic 22/1 to score more than once – which he did against Scotland in March’s World Cup qualifier.
England captain Harry Kane is, understandably, favourite to score but Everton’s Dominic Calvert-Lewin has four goals from seven international caps and his aerial prowess is a real threat from set-pieces and is 13/5 to be first goalscorer.
