We look ahead to the second Euro 2024 match in Group A with our Hungary vs Switzerland prediction and preview.
Hungary vs Switzerland Stats: The Key Insights
- Switzerland are favourites for this Euro 2024 match according to the Opta supercomputer, winning 43.0% of pre-match simulations.
- The Swiss have won six of their last nine matches against Hungary (D2 L1). They last tasted defeat in November 1998 in a Budapest friendly.
- Hungary were unbeaten across the Euro 2024 qualifiers, winning five and drawing three of their matches.
Hungary and Switzerland face off against one another in Cologne Stadium on Saturday afternoon already aware that host nation Germany enjoyed a heavy win over Scotland in the opening match on Friday night. As a result, a win in this match would give either side an excellent chance of progressing to the knockout stage of the tournament.
Hungary enjoyed an excellent Euro 2024 qualifying campaign, going without a loss in eight games (W5 D3). It was the first time ever that they’d gone through an entire European Championship qualifying campaign without a defeat. They’ll hope that qualifying form can give them the boost they need to improve on a record of just one win in nine matches at the European Championship across their last three tournament appearances in 1972, 2016 and 2020.
At Euro 2020, Hungary had arguably the toughest task of all nations, being placed alongside France, Germany and Portugal. They were, however, just minutes away from qualifying for the last 16 before eventually being eliminated as the bottom side in the group.
Hopes for Hungary are higher this time around, with star player Dominik Szoboszlai key to their chances of making it through the group stage.
The Liverpool midfielder was their main threat in qualifying with four goals and three assists, while he also topped their charts for chances created (23) and shots (28). He offers some of the threat that Hungary pose from set-pieces, too. Excluding the play-offs, Hungary scored the most goals from non-penalty set plays in the Euro 2024 qualifiers (7).
They arrive at the tournament having easily defeated Israel 3-0 on 8 June in their final warm-up game. Goals from Roland Sallai and Barnabás Varga (2) inside the opening 22 minutes secured another positive result in a run of just one defeat in 16 games since November 2022 – that loss came away at the Republic of Ireland on 4 June (2-1).
Switzerland will be looking to get off to a perfect start at Euro 2024 and make it three successive European Championship tournaments where they’ve reached the knockout stage. In fact, only France have reached the knockout stage across the last five major international tournaments alongside the Swiss among all European nations.
They reached these finals after qualifying behind Romania in Group I, and while hard to beat, Switzerland’s recent form hasn’t been massively encouraging. Seven of their last 11 international matches have ended in a draw, with three wins and a defeat. Their two Euro 2024 warm-up games saw them ease past Estonia 4-0, before drawing 1-1 with Austria four days later.
Striker Zeki Amdouni scored against the Estonians on 4 June and was also their top scorer in qualifying with six goals – he’s likely to be the man entrusted to find the goals at the tournament by head coach Murat Yakin.
The Swiss squad also contains three players to win European top-flight league titles this season in Granit Xhaka (Bayer Leverkusen), Manuel Akanji (Manchester City) and Yann Sommer (Inter) – all will be key to Switzerland’s chance of success this summer.
Hungary vs Switzerland Head-to-Head
This will be the first men’s senior international between Hungary and Switzerland since October 2017, when Switzerland enjoyed a 5-2 World Cup qualifer win in Basel. Steven Zuber grabbed a brace in that match, while Granit Xhaka scored the opening goal.
Hungary haven’t won any of their last three international matches versus Switzerland, with their last win against the Swiss coming in a November 1998 friendly.
This will be just the second ever meeting between Hungary and Switzerland at a major international tournament (Euros/World Cup), following the Hungarian’s 2-0 win at the 1938 World Cup.
Hungary vs Switzerland Prediction
Switzerland are favourites for this match, with the Opta supercomputer seeing them win 43.0% of the pre-game simulations.
However, this Group A match promises to be a close encounter with Hungary winning 29.0% of the time across the 10,000 sims before kick-off and the draw occurring 28.0% of the time.
Hungary vs Switzerland Squads
Hungary
Dénes Dibusz, Péter Gulácsi, Péter Szappanos, Ádám Lang, Attila Fiola, Attila Szalai, Bendegúz Bolla, Botond Balogh, Endre Botka, Loïc Négo, Márton Dárdai, Milos Kerkez, Willi Orbán, Zsolt Nagy, Ádám Nagy, András Schäfer, Callum Styles, Dániel Gazdag, Dominik Szoboszlai, Krisztofer Horváth, László Kleinheisler, Mihály Kata, Roland Sallai, Barnabás Varga, Kevin Csoboth, Martin Ádám.
Head coach: Marco Rossi
Switzerland
Gregor Kobel, Yann Sommer, Yvon Mvogo, Cédric Zesiger, Fabian Schär, Leonidas Stergiou, Manuel Akanji, Nico Elvedi, Ricardo Rodríguez, Silvan Widmer, Ardon Jashari, Denis Zakaria, Fabian Rieder, Granit Xhaka, Michel Aebischer, Remo Freuler, Renato Steffen, Rubén Vargas, Steven Zuber, Vincent Sierro, Xherdan Shaqiri, Breel Embolo, Dan Ndoye, Kwadwo Duah, Noah Okafor, Zeki Amdouni.
Head coach: Murat Yakin
Hungary vs Switzerland Predicted Lineups
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