The round of 16 at the Euro 2024 tournament concludes on Tuesday and the penultimate match of the stage gets the day underway when Romania and the Netherlands battle it out for a quarter final spot in Munich.
Romania were surprise winners of Group E to book their spot in this match while the Netherlands escaped Group D in third place. Both teams will know that they are in the kinder half of the draw and will look to take advantage.
Where to watch
The match will be shown live and in full on BBC1 in the UK with the build-up to the match beginning at 4.30pm ahead of the 5pm kick off.
Romania
When they went into the tournament, Romania were among the favourites to be one of the first ones to depart the competition but they tore that script up in their opening match when they cruised past Ukraine to get their campaign off to a winning start. From there they only had to stay upright to come out of the group but to actually go on and win it on goal difference, courtesy of a combination of a nice result which suited both parties against Slovakia and Belgium showing little intent to win group, is a decent achievement.
There is a feeling that firstly they are not as good as their record in the group suggested, partly because Ukraine were absolutely terrible in that first game and certainly contributed to their own downfall, but also because the third game was a convenient draw. There aren’t too many expecting them to go far in this event from here but they have another chance to shut the doubters up. If that is to happen we need to see them be ruthless in front of goal.
Netherlands
This has been an in and out campaign for the Netherlands but I certainly think that their performances have been a lot better than their results suggested, although ironically the game where they were at their poorest was the one they won against Poland. They were a dubious VAR decision away from beating France in their second game and then came out on the wrong end of an end-to-end match with Austria which could easily have gone the other way.
The strange thing about the Dutch is that going into the tournament they would have been expected to be defensively proficient and strong with the calibre of defenders they have in their ranks, but actually all three teams have got at them and had plenty of chances to score. That is certainly a concern but to be fair to the Dutch they have created a lot more than was expected and have different options up front depending on the test in front of them.
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Team News
The one casualty from a game you wouldn’t have thought Romania would have picked up many bookings in against Slovakia was Nicusor Bancu who picked up a second yellow in that one and is suspended for this.
Ronald Koeman has suggested that Manchester United target Joshua Zirkzee is available for selection after he has recovered from illness. Wout Weghorst is pushing for a start for the Oranje as well as Xavi Simons.
Betting
I’m not completely sure what I make of either of these sides and while the general feeling would be to expect Netherlands to win this match, I’m far from convinced that I can trust them but I certainly wouldn’t want to be on Romania either, unless I was to have a value bet on them to win the match at a big price, which might not be a bad call when you consider what we have seen in the knockout matches from the lesser sides so far.
The bet I do like though is for Romania to have more than 8.5 shots. If the Dutch do win this then Romania will have to be the ones pushing to get back into the game at some point which should see pot shots and things come naturally. The Dutch conceded double figures in shots to a very limited Poland side which is encouraging while Romania’s shot totals so far in this tournament are 10 vs Ukraine in a match the led after half an hour, 13 against Belgium and nine against Slovakia in a match that predictably fizzled out completely in the second half. You can get at this Dutch defence with the Orange midfield lacking in defensive quality and so however this one ends I think the 5/6 on Romania having nine or more shots in the game looks a solid play.
Tips
Back Romania – 9 or more shots for a 3/10 stake at 1.83 with Betfair
