Club football is taking a sabbatical as our favourite footballers will face each other as representatives of their respective countries. It does feel like a pain, especially because the club scene has been so intense lately with Manchester City losing a match, Real Madrid keeping the top spot and Juventus claiming it after beating Inter Milan. To be fair, that’s not to say that we won’t be entertained by what the International Break has in store, especially with Euro Qualifiers thrown into the mix. The stakes are not low and a lot of the flagship footballers will be playing in some potentially electrifying matches. So while it does seem on the surface that football is being watered down, upon further inspection, it is quite the contrary. Thus without further ado, let’s take a look at some of the best matches to look forward to in the international break.
#5. Portugal v Ukraine (15/10/2019; 12:15 am IST)
When Cristiano Ronaldo is involved and in such goal scoring form in the international scene, you can bet that the hype he brings alone is enough to put the match on anyone’s radar. Now he has the likes of Joao Felix, Bernardo Silva, Goncalo Guedes, Bruno Fernandes and many others to work with. The Portugal team looks to be very strong in the coming years and every match is a surefire indicator of how this anticipated team is progressing. On the other hand, we have the nation that was once home to Andriy Shevchenko. While another one like him might not appear for a while, players like Zinchenko and most recently, Yarmolenko have really improved on their form in the PL. Thus there’s a lot of interesting things to see and of course, there’s the fact that everyone is waiting for Ronaldo to not only cross 100 goals but cross the highest tally of 109.
#4. France v Iceland (12/10/2019; 12:15 am IST)
It’s the match of the World Cup winners. Who isn’t excited to see the likes of Antione Griezmann, Kylian MBappe, Paul Pogba and others take the international stage all together? Antoine Griezmann has had kind of a rough start with Barca so it will be interesting to see whether that affects the International stage. Same goes for Paul Pogba. For Iceland, while Sigurdsson is yet to find his footing, you can never count him out. He was arguably Everton’s best player in the 2018-19 season and this matching might be a turning point for the attacker.
#3. Netherlands v Northern Ireland (11/10/2019; 12:15 am IST)
To everyone’s shock, Netherlands, a team that has made the World Cup finals 3 times, failed to make it into the World Cup in 2018. Now, however, the case is quite different. With youngsters like De Ligt, De Jong and Van De Beek and Virgil Van Dijk, their captain being held as one of the best players in the world, leading the charge, they are looking to be favourites in the international scene. As a result, so many future great players’ progress, will be looked at and speculated upon with this upcoming friendly.
#2. England v Czech Republic (12/10/2019; 12:15 am IST)
England has so many good players right now, it will be interesting just to predict who will play the match. This will also affect how the teams for the games after the break will be kept to adjust with player fatigue. While a person like Harry Kane is looking to pick up his sharpshooter-esque form, people like Callum Wilson, Mason Mount and Jadon Sancho will look to improve on their momentum and get more permanent spots in the team. For the Czech Republic, a player like Patrik Schick will be looking to make a stand against the team that placed 4th in the 2018 World Cup.
#1. Brazil v Senegal ( 10/10/2019; 5:30 pm IST)
With so many great players between the two, this looks to be an exciting match up despite being friendly. Will Neymar play after his problems and subsequent terrific performances at PSG? How will a goalkeeper like Ederson do? Roberto Firmino has been incredible so far so it would be great to see how well he’ll adapt without his Liverpool co-forwards. Speaking of Liverpool co-forwards, it will be interesting to speculate on whether Mane’ will bring his blistering form to the international scene. Koulibaly will surely be kept busy by Brazil’s front-line. A great match is in the making and hopefully, it will fall in accordance with the sky-high expectations.
