North Macedonia – Malta

The favourite will get a solid win at home in Skopje

Northern Macedonia and Malta were drawn in the European Championship qualifying tournament alongside Italy, England, and Ukraine. If we use the customary football terminology, this national team line-up can be safely called the group of death. Needless to say, neither of the three European sides will be able to oust two of the three above-mentioned teams from the top of the table in the upcoming meeting in Skopje. Raising six points against the island team is likely to be the minimum target for North Macedonia in their upcoming qualifiers. According to specialist website transfermarkt, the total value of the North Macedonian players is six times higher than that of the visiting team - €58.88m versus €9.43m. The opponents' positions are also different according to the FIFA World Ranking, with the home team on 65th place and the visiting team on 167th. Bookmakers have quite logically proposed Northern Macedonia as the favourite to win the upcoming game, offering odds of 1.35. In recent years, Blagoje Milevski's team have proved to be one of continental football's strong midfielders. Northern Macedonia finished second behind Germany in the group stages of the qualifying for the 2021-2022 World Cup in Qatar before knocking out Italy in the semi-finals of the play-off phase, leaving one of the most decorated teams in Europe without a World Cup. After knocking out Portugal in the final, the North Macedonian side finished third in last year's Liga C of the Nations, behind Georgia and Bulgaria. Malta are among Europe's weakest teams, as they have shown in 2022 Nations League games. While the even weaker San Marino have been beaten twice in League D, the islanders have suffered two defeats at the hands of Estonia, leaving them in the continent's weakest division for another season. Malta's qualification for the 2021 World Cup took them to five points from ten games, making them the worst team in Group H. The last encounter between the two sides ended in a draw, while North Macedonia have won all their previous matches without fail. We're betting that the home side will win convincingly.