The best matches to follow this weekend
The Main Event
And so it begins. The most talked about, most controversial, World Cup of our lifetimes gets underway on Sunday. Tournament hosts Qatar, ranked no. 50 in the world, take on Ecuador in the opening game of Group A. The two have not previously met in competitive action – Qatar pulled out of the last Copa America that they were invited to and they were drawn in different groups when Qatar did participate in 2019. For their part, Ecuador survived various legal attempts to see them removed from the tournament via their rivals in South American qualifying and come in to the game with four goalless draws in their last five fixtures.
We have to wait until next week for the first games involving the tournament favourites – England face Iran on Monday while the USA play Wales. Argentina go up against Saudi Arabia on Tuesday, the same day on which France begin their title defence against Australia. The potential ‘Group of Death’ containing Germany and Spain play Wednesday while hotly tipped Brazil start against Serbia on Thursday evening.
International Friendlies
For those national team fans not involved in the FIFA spectacle, this is, of course, still an international break – meaning there are particularly meaningless friendly games taking place across the weekend. The most high profile encounter is probably Austria hosting Italy while our boys, Norway welcome Finland to Oslo on Sunday. There is even the odd club friendly available to follow in the app – including a game between Premier League strugglers Everton and Scottish league leaders Celtic taking place in Sydney.
Another tie that we should mention is the second match of San Marino’s rather glamorous tour to Saint Lucia. The world’s worst side have left Europe for the first time in an attempt to break an 18 year and 126 game run without a win. In Thursday’s first game against Saint Lucia (ranked no. 172 to San Marino’s no. 211), 19-year-old debutant Lorenzo Lazzari scored, in injury-time, to claim a 1-1 draw for the Microstate.
Increased coverage for Women’s Leagues
There is plenty of men’s football still taking place in the lower divisions that we cover in the app but perhaps the top club action will come in the various first tier women’s leagues that are available.
In particular, there’s a full fixture list in England’s WSL where league leaders Arsenal take on in-form Manchester United on Saturday.
We’re also pleased to announce that we have increased our coverage for the Spanish Liga F and the Frauen-Bundesliga in Germany. This means live match stats and our famous player ratings will be available for these league, as they already are in WSL, NWSL and Women’s Champions League.
Among the Liga F fixtures this weekend, the ever-dominant Barcelona play Deportivo Alavés on Sunday while there are also Basque and Seville Derbies to look forward to.
And finally, it’s not too late to try out our tournament predictor game – here.
If you want to follow any of the games mentioned above, click on the relevant link and tap the bell icon to receive all the key match updates.
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Cover Image from IMAGO