Netherlands vs Bosnia & Herzegovina prediction: EUROPE: UEFA Nations League – League A betting tips on match 2024-09-06 18:45.
[p]After falling at the penultimate hurdle in extra time to Croatia (L 4-2) in the previous edition of the UEFA Nations (UNL), the Netherlands face a potentially tougher group than the one they cruised through with a near-perfect record (W5, D1) on the way to the semi-finals last time around. But a format change that will see the top two in the four League A groups progress to a new quarter-finals bracket will at least ensure they don’t have to scrap with A3 group favourites Germany to advance, which can only be viewed as a bonus. [/p]
[p]Fuelled by the heartbreak of a Euro 2024 semi-final loss to England, they’ll be preparing for a crunch meeting at home to Germany by hosting Bosnia & Herzegovina, who they last hosted during the 2020/21 Nations League (W 3-1). They should be quietly confident of opening this campaign with three points, winning all but one of six matches on home soil (L 2-1 as outsiders to France).[/p]
[p]Bosnia & Herzegovina are the outsiders of the group, not only as they enter as a newly promoted nation but because they come into the tournament with the longest current losing streak of any Nations League team when including friendlies (L6). They’ll be setting out to improve upon their only previous appearance in the highest division of this competition, when collecting just two points from their six UNL games in 2020/21. [/p]
[p]Progressing to the quarter-finals would need them to pick up an upset win or two along the way, which is something that the Bosnians have seemingly forgotten how to do of late. Not since 2018 have they won as pre-match outsiders home or away (D7, L20), a 27-game stretch that includes each of their two historical H2Hs against the Dutch. [/p]
[p]Players to watch: Dutch midfielder Joey Veerman could earn a start in this new-look attack following his return of five goal contributions (G1, A4) in his last four Eredivisie appearances for PSV. Bosnia captain Edin Džeko missed the June friendlies and returns as the man to have delivered seven of the country’s 16 all-time UNL goals. [/p]
[p]Hot streak: Bosnia & Herzegovina have lost their last four matches against current top-ten FIFA ranked nations ‘to nil’ (agg. 0-12).[/p]
[p][i]Written by Aaron Murphy[/i][/p]