Scotland vs Hungary Odds
| Scotland Odds | +150 |
| Hungary Odds | +155 |
| Draw | +275 |
| Over / Under | 2.5 -138 / +110 |
Hungary and Scotland will meet for their final group stage match with both teams needing a win to have a chance at making the knockout stage.
Scotland rebounded nicely from a 5-1 defeat against Germany, playing a very even 1-1 draw with Switzerland. A draw is not good enough for Scotland here, so it is going to have to be aggressive, which goes against its usual style of play.
Hungary was deservingly beaten by Germany 2-0 to make it two losses in a row to begin its Euro 2024 campaign. They not only need a victory from this match, but are going to need to make up a pretty big negative goal difference to have a chance at qualifying for the knockout stage via the third-place route.
Scotland
Scotland was able to get a draw against Switzerland, but there are still some pretty glaring weaknesses in this squad. In possession, they simply are trying to send the ball long up the pitch, but they don't have a striker that can hold up the ball, they don't have any wingers attacking in wide areas and their midfielders are struggling to play through the middle of the pitch. They are just relying on getting a chance to cross the ball into the box or getting a chance off a set piece — and even then, their set piece routines have been pretty bad.
This will be a different type of scenario for them, as they need a win from this match and can't simply sit back when they are out of possession. There were a few instances during qualifying when they were in a negative game state when they had to press and did so in a man-to-man fashion. That's actually not the worst idea against Hungary because Scotland is more physical than them and are actually a decent transition defense.
The issue though is that it's out of Scotland's comfort zone to play aggressively. Even against Switzerland when it was 1-1 and they realistically needed to go for it, they still were playing really conservative, so it's a big worry when a passive team suddenly has to change its entire identity for one match.
Hungary
Hungary is in an all-in spot, and it's not the type of situation that suits them.
Much like Scotland, Hungary is a passive 5-3-2 team by nature; once you get them out of that structure and into a negative game state, they are one of the worst teams in this tournament. During qualifying, they really were never trailing, so they didn't need to press high. There were times when they did try to counter press after losing the ball and they were incredibly slow and inefficient at closing the ball down.
What that led to was easy transition opportunities for their opponents and it's where they allowed most of their big scoring chances. They are also one of the worst set piece defenses in this entire tournament. Even though Scotland has been poor on set pieces so far, it's how they create most of their chances, so they will have opportunities.
The other problem with Hungary is they are not a good build-up team. They are too reliant on Dominik Szoboszlai to do everything for them, even in the final third. So, when teams are able to take him away, they don't have a lot of other options and it often ends with some type of low quality cross, which Scotland is good at defending.
Scotland vs Hungary
Prediction
If this match wasn't the third one of the group stage with both teams needing to win, the total would be much lower, and the price on the draw would also be significantly less. These two teams are dead even by the odds and in my power ratings as well. More than that, they play the exact same style in the same formation, so what we are getting here is an inflated price on the total and draw because of the situation.
Whoever goes ahead first is going to concede control of the match and give the other every opportunity to bring this match back level.
I have the draw projected at +263, so I like the value on the current price of +290.
Pick: Draw (+290 via DraftKings)
