EURO 2024 Group C: Into the Three Lions' den 🇸🇮🇩🇰🇷🇸🏴󠁧󠁢󠁥󠁮󠁧󠁿 | OneFootball

England join the EURO 2024 party today. Here is the lowdown on the Three Lions and their Group C opponents.

Who is in Group C?

The favourites

Tipped by many to win the whole thing, EURO 2020 finalists England will at least be expected to get out of this group and go deep into the tournament.

The Three Lions don’t look the strongest defensively, but the wealth of midfield and attacking talent at Gareth Southgate’s disposal – Declan Rice, Trent Alexander-Arnold, Jude Bellingham, Kobbie Mainoo, Phil Foden, Bukayo Saka, Harry Kane and more – means they should concern any opponent they come up against in Germany this summer.

What’s the key game?

A repeat of the EURO 2020 semi-final, England’s meeting with Denmark in Frankfurt on matchday two looks like one to watch.

The Danes have Euros pedigree having won the tournament in 1992, and they topped their qualifying group (which also featured Group C opponents Slovenia) with consummate ease.

Striker Rasmus Højlund will be familiar to England’s players, and the Manchester United man was Denmark’s top scorer in qualifying with seven goals.

In fact, when Denmark play at the Euros, there tends to be goals. Per Opta, their 33 matches at European Championships have produced on average 2.79 goals, the highest ratio of the 12 teams to have played more than 20 matches in the competition.

This looks like it could be the match which defines who tops Group C.

Can you give me a player to watch for each team?

Benjamin Šeško (Slovenia)

Perhaps sensibly, the 21-year-old quelled speculation linking him with a move to the Premier League by signing a new contract with RB Leipzig days before the tournament began, and can now focus on his football in Germany this summer.

It was his penalty against Kazakhstan which secured Slovenia’s qualification for their first Euros since 2000, and he will be eager to justify the hype around him at the first major international tournament of his career.

Mikkel Damsgaard (Denmark)

The flying young winger was one of the stars of Denmark’s run to the semi-finals in 2020 and scored against England that night.

Now 23, Damsgaard has since swapped Atalanta for Premier League club Brentford, and will be hoping to put a disappointing season in which he scored zero goals and notched just two assists behind him at the Euros.

Strahinja Pavlović (Serbia)

Striking duo Dušan Vlahović and Aleksandar Mitrović will hold the key to Serbia’s chances at the tournament, but they also have a rising star at the back in the form of RB Salzburg centre-back Pavlović.

He is only 23 but looks and plays like a grizzled veteran, and already has 35 senior international caps and 12 appearances in the Champions League to his name.

Kobbie Mainoo (England)

Prior to his first-team debut in November, few outside of Manchester United were familiar with Mainoo’s talents, but his rise in the second half of last season was meteoric, and the 19-year-old will be hoping to add to his three senior caps at the Euros.

A versatile, technically gifted and tactically astute midfielder, Mainoo scored some superb goals last season (including what proved to be the winner against Manchester City in the FA Cup final) and could be a great foil for Rice and Bellingham in this England team.

And the big storyline?

The talent of Mainoo and others does present England boss Southgate with a selection dilemma, and it will be interesting to see how he manages his squad over the course of the tournament.

Rice and Bellingham will likely be two of the first names on the team-sheet, with Liverpool’s Alexander-Arnold expected to start the tournament alongside them in midfield.

It means England will kick-off against Serbia on Sunday with a team which has never played together before – an exciting prospect but also a strategy which could backfire.

Kane, Foden and Saka are considered England’s primary attacking options but should they falter, Southgate has Cole Palmer, Anthony Gordon, Ollie Watkins and Ivan Toney to fall back on.

There are potential match-winners everywhere you look in this squad, but could it be a case of too many cooks spoiling the broth?

Prediction