Switzerland and France meet tonight at the Arena Fonte Nova in a Group E match that most pundits are tipping France to win. The teams are level on points at the top of the group, and both will be hoping for a win this evening in order to help secure a big foothold on staying top of the group and gaining qualification to the second round. This has however, been a tournament of upsets and surprises, with England still to win a game with only one game left in the group stages, Brazil being held to a draw with Mexico, and perhaps most shockingly, Spain being dumped out of the tournament with losses to Chile and the Netherlands.
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Switzerland saw off Ecuador in their opening match in dramatic style, with the game drawn at 1-1 all the way up to the 93rd minute, when Seferovic picked up the ball from a fast Swiss counter attack to put the ball home and finally seal the win. The two goals scored by the Swiss came as the result of two assists by the same player, Rodriguez, the pacey left back with bags of crossing ability. This will be a closely fought game with these two sides no strangers, having met 36 times. Throughout these games, the French have triumphed 15 times, with the Swiss winning 12. Switzerland were exposed a few times at the back by Ecuador, so the French will be looking to test the same weaknesses.
Gokhan Inler has stated that his team’s focus will remain unchanged and has insisted that his team’s togetherness comes from a sense of unity saying simply “We all play for Switzerland. Maybe we are a slightly cosmopolitan lineup and what will happen in the future is unclear, but for now, we are all playing for Switzerland. The most important thing is respect.” After Switzerland passed a new referendum introducing a quota on European immigrants a German TV channel photoshopped out the faces of the players in the Switzerland squad that would not be eligible to play due to their nationality and status. This left the Swiss with only three players eligible.
For the moment, however, the World Cup is the prevailing focus, with the Swiss team showing no sign of weakness or disadvantage from their multi-ethnic backgrounds of Kosovo, Yugoslavia, Albania and Turkey. Switzerland currently sit a surprising sixth in the FIFA rankings after coming through qualifying completely unbeaten, an impressive record which has been attributed to manager Ottmar Hitzfeld who has done much to transform and improve the squad since he took charge in 2006.
Whether or not that will be enough to see off les Bleus remains to be seen however, with the French team looking in decent form in their opening, winning fixture against Honduras. Honduras however, didn’t seem to want to play football, with many of their highly physical challenges likened to something from a WWF fight scene, and also seemed content to invite the French into their half. Tonight’s encounter will be interesting to say the least, and will be a very different challenge for both teams in comparison to their respective opening fixtures.
