Poland vs Albania

Albania head to the PGE Narodow to take on Poland in their opening Euro 2024 qualifying game.

After four consecutive appearances at the European Championship finals, Poland’s hopes of maintaining that impressive trend took a blow as they suffered a 3-1 defeat to the Czech Republic in their Group E opener. Having suffered back-to-back two-goal margin losses down the final stretch of their decent 2022 World Cup campaign, the Poles would’ve hoped for a better start to life under new manager Fernando Santos. Left to pick up the pieces after a dismal trip to the neighboring country, the ‘Eagles’ will be looking to reboot against an Albania side they’ve lost to only once in their 13 all-time H2Hs (W9, D3) while winning each of the last seven in a row by an aggregate score of 11-2.

But with five of those seven matches yielding a narrow 1-0 scoreline, visiting Albania will fancy their chances of starting a potentially historic Euro qualifying campaign on the front foot. Ranked 44 places below their hosts (#22) in FIFA rankings, the Albanians (#66) will likely have to pull a rabbit out of the hat to break their horrendous streak against Poland. On a more positive note, Albania claimed a 2-0 win over Armenia in November, ending an embarrassing ten-match losing run (D5, L5), suggesting a second-ever win at the start of a Euro qualification campaign could be on the cards. To quickly douse the optimism, Sylvinho’s men have only won once in their last ten away outings (D3, L6).