After their 3-1 victory against Poland in Berlin on Friday, Austria’s national team has every chance of making it to the round of 16 of the European Football Championship in Germany. With another win on Tuesday (6 p.m., live on Servus TV), also in the German capital against the Netherlands, the Austrians would secure their own promotion and would at least be second in the group. If France does not win the parallel match against Poland (6 p.m., live on ORF1), the ÖFB eleven could even win the group.
The winner of Austria’s Group D will face the runner-up from Pool F, which includes Portugal and Turkey, in Leipzig on July 2nd. The runner-up in the group will face their counterpart from the completely open Group E in the first knockout round on July 1st in Düsseldorf, in which Romania, Ukraine and Slovakia are all on three points and favourites Belgium lost their opening match. If the Austrians advance as third in the group, Gelsenkirchen, Cologne (both on June 30th) and Munich (June 2nd) are the possible venues for the round of 16. The opponents would be either a group winner or winner of Group C or E.
Three points can be enough for promotion
The four best of a total of six third-placed teams in the pool will advance to the knockout phase. The chances of being one of them with three points and a balanced or slightly negative goal difference are good. The ÖFB selection currently has a goal difference of plus one, so in theory they could still hope even if they narrowly lost to the Dutch. But then it might not be clear at the end of the game on Tuesday whether Austria will continue in the tournament. Three groups will be completed after that, two of them only on the following day.
A draw against the Dutch would put the Austrians third in the group in any case. With four points, no third-placed team has been eliminated since the current format was introduced at the 2016 European Championship.
