The long-awaited Euro 2024 tournament kicks off today June 14, with a group A clash involving tournament host Germany going up against Scotland.

Event # 1 – Euro 2024 – Germany vs Scotland – 2:00 PM

The host nation Germany have won the Euro on three previous occasions: 1972, 1980, 1996.

In prior years, Germany were normally feared heading into major tournaments but not much in recent times, as they have struggled for wins over the last year.

As the host of the 2024 Euro, the Germans have had to play a number of friendlies over the past year in preparation for the tournament and suffered several defeats throughout 2023 against Belgium, Poland, Japan, and Austria, which did little to suggest the host are serious contenders to win the tournament on home soil.

Recent wins over European heavyweights France and Netherlands in March suggest they are in decent form heading into today’s match. In the host nation’s group are Hungary, Scotland, and Switzerland.

Let’s take a look on their chances of advancing to the knockout round.

Hungary — their best finish at the Euro was a third-place finish back in 1964, they could be viewed a one of the ‘dark horses” in the group as they are on a long unbeaten run stretching 14 games, which came after they defeated England home and away two years ago. They also beat Germany away when they met in September 2022.

Scotland — they have exited at the group stages on each of the three times they contested the Euro prior to the upcoming tournament — (1992, 1996, 2020). After failing to make five-consecutive Euro, Scotland have now qualified for back-to-back Euros and will be aiming to better their 2020 showing.

Switzerland — their best finish came in 2020 when they got knocked out at the quarter-finals stage. The Swiss are rarely favoured at major tournaments, but they were quarter-finalist at Euro 2020 and have reached the last 16 in the last three World Cups.