Bet on Croatia to put more shots on goal than Italy in Monday’s matchup in the 2024 Euros

A late goal by Albania could put Croatia at risk of missing the knockout stage in the 2024 UEFA European Football Championship.

The Vatreni failed to hold on to a 2-1 lead as Klaus Gjasula scored from the center of the box into the bottom left corner. After settling for a draw (2-2), Croatia is now at the bottom of Group B, trailing Albania in goal differential (-2).

On Monday, it’ll play its final group-stage match against Italy, the current European champions. Italy is the favorite to win on the three-way money line, with odds as high as +145 and +135 on the 0.5-goal spread.

Although Italy is in a much better position, considering it sits second in the group with three points, the Azzurri will have their hands full against a Croatian team that will give their all until the final whistle.

Odds via DraftKings

It’s been a disappointing start to the tournament for Croatia, given some of its recent success.

Facing Spain in the opener certainly wasn’t ideal, as La Roja might be the most menacing team in the competition. Spain was clinical from the start, scoring three goals in the first half to put the match to bed.

However, despite Spain’s convincing 3-0 victory, the Croatians had the bulk of the possession (53.3%- 46.7%). Moreover, Croatia matched the Spaniards in shots on target (5-5) while registering more shot attempts (16-11).

It could have been a completely different result had Croatia managed to convert one of its chances. Even while facing an almost insurmountable deficit, the Vatreni were determined to keep pushing forward to salvage something from the match.

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Italy recovered from conceding an early goal against Albania to win the match 2-1. Alessandro Bastoni scored in the 11th minute before Nicolo Barella put the Azzurri ahead for good with a gorgeous shot from outside the box at the 16-minute mark.

Although Italy seemed to build momentum heading into its match against Spain, it was completely outclassed and played off the pitch.

Spain dominated the ball in possession (57.1%-42.9%) and registered nine shots on goal on 20 attempts, compared to just one shot on target for Italy on four attempts. The Spaniards actually finished the game with an expected goal (xG) tally of 2.0 vs. 0.25 for Italy.

While Italy is renowned for its defensive qualities, its attacking offense has sometimes looked unimaginative in this tournament.

After picking up three points against Albania, the Italians might be looking to simply hang on to get out of the group stage.

Although the top two teams in each group automatically qualify for the Round of 16, the four best third-placed teams will also advance. The six third-place finishers are essentially placed in a separate table and ranked based on the following order:

As things stand, Slovenia is currently the last third-place team that would qualify, as it has two points through two games and a goal difference of zero.

Since the Union of European Football Associations introduced this format at the 2016 tournament, no team has advanced with just two points. Croatia will likely need all three points against Italy to progress in the competition.

Thus, we should see a very direct approach from Croatia in attack, resulting in a decent share of shots on goal. Croatia should have more of the ball after dominating possession in both previous group-stage matches.

More possession generally results in more shots, and at DraftKings, you can back the Vatreni to finish with more attempts on target than Italy at even money.

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