Serbia vs Lithuania prediction: EUROPE: Euro – Qualification betting tips on match 2023-03-23 19:45.
Serbia manager Dragan Stojković had no qualms in accepting that their 2022 Qatar World Cup campaign (D1, L2) was a disaster and he sees the European qualifiers “as an opportunity to regain our reputation.” Euro qualification for the first time as an independent nation would be the perfect antidote to the agonising heartbreak they endured in the 2020 qualifying campaign when losing via penalties in the play-off finals.
A strong start will lay a solid foundation as Serbia look to maintain their tradition of having never lost their first match of a Euro qualifying campaign (W2, D2) as an independent state. Facing Lithuania may not be a bad omen in that regard as the hosts have won their four historical home H2Hs, three times by a three-goal margin!
One of those losses (4-1) came in what was current boss Edgaras Jankauskas’ last match of his previous stint as Lithuania manager! As he starts a new chapter at the helm after an absence of nearly five years, his immediate and self-proclaimed aim is “to win as many matches as possible”, and more importantly, halt a ten-game winless run (D2, L8) in European qualifiers.
That could be a tall order based not only on their historical H2H record (W1, L7) but also on their recent nine-game form (D1, L8) as Lithuania’s search for a win clocks nearly one year to the date of this match! Any hopes of breaking that drought here would also need them to end a run of five consecutive losses on the road, four of which have come without scoring.
Players to watch: Having recently created unwanted headlines by shoving the referee in his FA Cup quarter-final loss for Fulham, Serbia’s Aleksandar Mitrović may look to banish those against a team he accrued five goals from his last three H2Hs. The visitors could be praying for action from Fedor Černych who scored a brace in their last competitive win in October 2021.
Hot stat: All but two of Serbia’s last 14 European Championship qualifiers at home saw both teams score on the day.