We have to be excited until the last moment of the group stage

England could not enforce the paper form, only managing a meager – and rather low-quality – 0-0 against Slovenia. With this result, the Slovenians advanced and pushed Marco Rossi’s team to the last place in the table of the third group of the best four.

There are four matches left in the group stage of the European Championship: Slovakia-Romania and Ukraine-Belgium matches will be held in Group E from 18:00, and in Group F, which seems much more important to us, there will be Georgia-Portugal and the most important for us Turkey-Czech match. If the latter goes badly, we have to rely on extreme results.

Did I catch a turkey (but it won’t release)?

According to data analyst calculations, the Hungarians still have a 68 percent chance of advancing, since the most obvious scenario is that Portugal defeats Georgia (but at least they don’t lose from it), and Turkey secures its own advancement against the Czech Republic. By the way, a draw suits the Turks perfectly, even with a two-goal defeat they can be in the round of 16, but in the latter case, they won’t be the second-placed team in the group, but they will go on as the 4th-best group-fourth after knocking us out.

There is also an option for the Hungarian team to advance even if the Czechs win, but this must be by a three-goal margin or more. In fact, this possibility would not even be worth mentioning, since the Turks – ahead of the Croatians and Wales – easily made it to the European Championship, they have players from Inter, Juventus, Benfica, Real Madrid and the big Turkish teams. However, Vincenzo Montella’s team, there is nothing to beautify about it, they defend sloppily in the European Championship, so it is quite possible that they will be thoroughly beaten – as the Portuguese did.

The Czechs are the fourth most enthusiastic team in the entire tournament when it comes to shots on goal (16 shots/match), although the Turks are ahead of them in this regard (16.5), but the Czech defense works better, especially in terms of the opponents’ shooting positions . So it does not seem impossible that the match will be a draw, nor that the Czechs will thoroughly beat the Turks. Both results are worth Hungarian advancement.

Science fiction

Of course, the big question is that if the Czech Republic takes a 2-0 lead against the Turks, what motivates them to attack further, since even a two-goal victory would ensure not only their advancement, but also their best third place position. So it would be much better for us if the Turkish team shakes itself up and beats the Czechs, or at least doesn’t lose to them.

For further scenarios resulting in Hungarian advancement, we have to visit the world of science fiction. In group E, for example, we should count the goals strongly, since everyone here has three points: it is good for us if the Belgians beat Ukraine by at least two goals, while Slovakia loses to Romania (in any ratio). Reversed results can also be good, but the Ukrainians and Slovaks should also win with a flurry of goals so that the third in the group does not have a better goal difference than our -3.

We really want to celebrate – but it’s different (Photo: #rhetiphoto)

It would be an interesting development if Slovakia lost 3-0 to Romania, because in this case our northern neighbor would be on the same page as we are. In this case, the yellow cards would decide – moreover, not in our favor: Hungary is one of the most sanctioned teams: only the Austrians received more than our nine yellow cards, and Slovakia is the most sportsmanlike team of the entire tournament: its players have only received one yellow card so far.

It is not worth relying on this, although we will get answers to the questions of group E already in the afternoon, so in principle it may happen that the evening matches will no longer be at stake for us. But it is more likely that it will only be revealed in the evening matches, in the last minutes of those matches, whether we will be among the top sixteen.