England, who won all 10 of their qualifiers, are the favourites in Group B. They take on neighbours Wales, who are taking part in their first major tournament finals since the 1958 World Cup, along with Russian Federation and Slovakia.
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The British teams meet on Thursday, June 16, in Lens in an afternoon kick-off for their second match of Group B, with Hodgson’s side playing Russian Federation first in Marseille on June 11 and Slovakia the final group opponents in St Etienne on Monday, June 20.
Roy Hodgson has been given the backing of the Football Association to take the England team through to the 2018 World Cup.
“We know the Wales players because all of them basically play in England”.
Turkey will be facing tough opposition in next year’s Euro 2016 after it was drawn against defending champion Spain, Croatia and the Czech Republic in the group stage in Paris on Saturday.
Here is the full list of countries and their groups.
The Republic of Ireland have also proved in their qualifying campaign that they have superb teamwork to make up for the lack of star names.
“It’s a strong group, it has no weak teams”, Poland coach Adam Nawalka said.
“We know their players because they all basically play in England, but we know the team is well organised, they have a fantastic team spirit and a fantastic spine”.
“To get the opportunity to play the world champions in Paris in a major tournament is going to be a great occasion”. The group winners, runners up and the best third placed team among all groups advanced to the tournament automatically, while the remaining eight third placed teams played in a playoff round.
“We have a rather balanced group… which we have to win”, Germany coach Joachim Loew said.
Antonio Conte’s side will open up their campaign against Belgium on the 13th June, four days later Italy face Sweden and the Republic of Ireland on the 22nd June.
Russian Federation and Slovakia were the other nations drawn in the group, but Hodgson warned a Bale-led Wales will be England’s biggest threat.
Similarly, Northern Ireland have had some unbelievable results in qualifying so you can’t rule them out of progressing. “Hard games to look forward for the fans but it could not be tougher for us”, O’Neill told the BBC.
France will kick off Euro 2016 on 10 June with a game against Romania.
It was 2004 and striker Zlatan Ibrahimovic hit an 85th minute equaliser to secure a 1-1 draw and rob the Azzurri of a possible three points in their penultimate group game.
“At the end of the draw the chief executive said to me: “Well you have to beat Germany if you want to win the tournament”, and of course that was slightly tongue in cheek, but everybody’s looking forward to it”.
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PROJECTED TOP TWO: France should win the group ahead of Switzerland, with Albania and Romania both lacking enough firepower to threaten.
