England vs Serbia live updates: Euro 2024 match team news ...

Seeing a referee standing in the middle of the pitch getting teary-eyed is not a familiar sight.

Referees get more than enough abuse to warrant some on-field emotion, but when Italian referee Daniele Orsato wiped his eyes at the Parc des Princes in Paris last month, it was for another reason entirely.

Orsato had blown the whistle at the end of his 55th and final Champions League match. The 48-year-old, who became an international referee in 2010, is set to retire after Euro 2024. What a game in which to bow out for the man who officiated 289 games in Serie A.

Orsato has plenty of experience taking charge of high profile games. In 2022 he was the referee as Bayern Munich secured their sixth Champions League title with a 1-0 win over PSG in Lisbon.

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In attack, Serbia can be devastating. They have scored in 33 out of 39 Dragan Stojkovic’s games and have scored three or more on 13 occasions. They won their 2022 Nations League group featuring Norway, Slovenia (also in this Euros group) and Sweden, with the best attack of any League B team (13 goals in six games).

No wonder Stojkovic has labelled his team a “golden generation”.

As we mentioned, the action starts in Hamburg today where Poland and the Netherlands meet in Group D.

That game is just getting underway and you can find our live coverage of that match here.

As we've had four games so far, we're a third of the way through the action in Group A and B.

Here is how they're looking:

Germany got the party started on Friday in emphatic fashion, thrashing an awful Scotland team in Munich.

Then Switzerland had to battle against Hungary before Breel Embolo's stoppage-time goal in yesterday's first game before Spain cruised past Croatia.

In the last game of the day, Italy survived an early scare to see off Albania in Group B.

The action got underway in Munich on Friday evening, but yesterday was the first of several three-match days.

Poland vs Netherlands is the first today and starts in exactly half an hour — here is the line up on day three of Euro 2024:

All three of these matches have their own dedicated live blog right here on The Athletic, so you don't need to go anywhere else for your footy fix.

Kyle Walker has been named England vice captain ahead of their Euro 2024 campaign beginning against Serbia on Sunday.

Walker, 34, is Gareth Southgate’s second-most experienced player in Germany, making 83 appearances for the Three Lions, which is eight behind captain Harry Kane.

The Manchester City right-back will replace Jordan Henderson, who was left out of the Euro 2024 squad by Southgate, in the role as vice captain.

Walker made his senior England debut against Spain in November 2011 and has been a regular fixture in the national team ever since.

Germany and Spain are the most successful nations in European Championship history with three titles apiece and are followed by holders Italy and France who have both won two.

Six nations follow them with one each, but England and Serbia are not among them, having never won the tournament.

England came closest in the last European Championship, but were beaten by Italy on penalties despite taking an early lead in the match.

The European Championship has been played every four years since 1960, but the tournament looks much different now to how it did 64 years ago.

In 1960, 17 teams entered the competition but the finals were whittled down to just four teams: France, Yugoslavia, Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia.

And for 20 years, that is how it stayed until a decision was made to double the amount of competing teams to eight.

Following triumphs for West Germany (1980), France (1984), Netherlands (1988) and Denmark (1992), the field doubled again to 16.

And with the quality of European football continuing to improve at an exponential rate, the demand for a 24-team tournament grew and was finally passed a few months after the 2008 Championship.

This will be the fourth Euros played with 24 teams and, despite calls to increase to 32 teams, that is how it will stay for the foreseeable future after UEFA confirmed last year that ‘no change has been proposed for the UEFA EURO final tournament”.

A “major police operation” is under way after a man threatened police with an axe in an incident close to a Euro 2024 fan park in St Pauli, Hamburg.

Hamburg police confirmed a man with a “pick-axe and an incendiary device” was shot by officers at around 12.30pm on Sunday before the Group D match between the Netherlands and Poland.

A statement said: “A person threatened police officers with a pickaxe and an incendiary device.

“The police then used their firearms. The attacker was injured and is currently receiving medical treatment.”

Read more below

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Man shot after threatening police with an axe near Euro 2024 fan zone

So many years of hurt for England. But they come into Euro 2024 as tournament favourites...

Did not qualify: 1960, 1964, 1972, 1976, 1984, 2008

This year marks Serbia's first involvement at the European Championship.

The Aleksandar Mitrovic-Dusan Tadic combination.

One has assisted the other 21 times (unsurprisingly, 19 have been Tadic to Mitrovic) in 76 caps together. This included three goals in Euros qualification and one against Switzerland at the World Cup.

No prizes for guessing the goal method — an early, near-post cross for a glancing header.

Conceding goals. Serbia have only kept four clean sheets in 15 games since the World Cup, particularly problematic as Serbia have only played two teams ranked in FIFA’s top 20 (USA and Belgium) in that time. Impressively, Serbia have only had three losses by two or more goals under Stojkovic, but this owes more to their attack than a watertight defence.

Behind Costa Rica, Serbia had the second-worst 2022 World Cup group-stage defence. They faced 50 shots worth 7.6 expected goals and conceded eight times. It cost them qualification, drawing against Cameroon and losing against Switzerland despite leading in both matches. “At this level there are no excuses. We had the talent to score goals, but it’s often not just about talent, but about organisation,” said Tadic.

Their porousness owes to build-up errors against a high press (see their friendly against Belgium in March) but mainly aggressive use of wing-backs defensively. Rather than keeping a flat back five, Serbia jump their wing-backs to opposition No 8s/No 10s, vacating space in behind and pulling centre-backs wide to cover against wingers.

Aleksandar Mitrovic and Dusan Tadic, even with the pair moving to relatively lower-quality leagues last summer — Mitrovic from Fulham to Saudi Arabia’s Al Hilal, and Tadic from Ajax in the Netherlands to Turkey’s Fenerbahce.

Mitrovic’s international record speaks for itself: 58 goals in 91 caps, with 12 braces and three hat-tricks. When he is on it, Mitrovic is hard to stop, especially for opponents who struggle to defend aerial balls into the box.

Tadic, now 35, still puts up outstanding creative numbers. Only four players bettered his four assists in qualifying, and Serbia’s attack — particularly from central spaces — gains another gear entirely when the No 10 is on the field. He has every final pass in the book: through balls to lock-pick defences, crosses from either side for the No 9s, cutbacks and one-twos to connect with the wing-backs.

Serbia (formerly part of Yugoslavia) are at their first Euros as a nation-state, after gaining independence in 2006. Head coach Dragan Stojkovic, whose contract ends after the tournament, has said qualifying from the group “would be a success”.

Those who watched them at the 2022 World Cup can expect the same setup: a back five, wing-backs and two defensive midfielders, but either two No 10s and a lone No 9 or one No 10 behind a front two.

Their attacking style is mixed, with a 62 per cent possession average in qualifying — about the same as England and Italy. Against better opposition, though, their strengths are playing direct. Aleksandar Mitrovic is the main focal point but likes to drop in, and is paired with off-the-shoulder Dusan Vlahovic or Luka Jovic.

Crosses are Serbia’s main route to goal, especially down the left and particularly from the wing-backs. They had the most headed shots in Euros qualifying, while only Spain and Portugal (seven each) had more headed goals than Serbia’s five. Look out for up-back-through attacking combinations to find the No 10 by playing into the No 9, and then releasing the wing-back.

Against a mid-block, Serbia pull one of the defensive midfielders out to create a makeshift back four, pushing the outside centre-back to the touchline and the wing-back upfield — this allows them to overload the last line.

Positionally, left-back. Luke Shaw, “physically vulnerable” in Southgate’s words, is the only natural left-back and enters the tournament injured. England’s results with a right-footer (Kieran Trippier) at left-back are better than one might expect, but they do lose an attacking dimension and might need to shuffle their right side to compensate creatively.

Collectively, defending counter-attacks. England’s ambition to dominate games against even the best means their counter-press has to be spot on. Southgate said it was “exceptional” in the 3-1 win away to Scotland, but it was not in the Wembley defeat against Brazil.

England’s high line gave too much space for Brazil’s front three to run in behind, and they duly conceded their most big chances (seven) in any game under Southgate.

While plenty of today’s pre-match discussion will no doubt fixate on England’s attacking options, their defensive record has been excellent up to now.

At the past two tournaments, England kept more clean sheets (eight) than goals conceded (six) in 12 games, and only allowed four goals against in eight Euros qualifying matches. Only Argentina (39) bettered England’s final-third regains at the World Cup (34).

Even so, the absence of Harry Maguire through injury, and the lack of clarity about when Luke Shaw will be fit, means England head into Euro 2024 with more defensive questions than many expected.

Three major tournaments for England under Gareth Southgate: one quarter-final finish (World Cup 2022), one semi-final (World Cup 2018) and one final (Euro 2020). They have gone incredibly close and vanquished certain national demons but do not yet have silverware to show for it.

Southgate has evolved England into a style more like 2008-2012 Spain than the England teams of the same era. “We’ve been more dominant in the games we’ve played. We have had complete control in pretty much every match,” said Southgate at the end of 2023.

England showed at World Cup 2022 that they no longer needed to system switch against bigger nations. They continued with the 4-3-3 in the quarter-finals against France, rather than going to the 3-4-3. Jude Bellingham’s exceptional development means a 4-2-3-1, with him the No 10, ought to be plan A in Germany.

Though a back four on paper, right-back Kyle Walker tucked round in build-up in knockout games in Qatar. This provided cover against the pacy Ismaila Sarr and, more importantly, Kylian Mbappe, when England played Senegal and France.

England turning their 4-3-3 into a 3-2-5 attacking shape is synonymous with how most top Premier League sides attack. Southgate has said they are “looking at creative solutions”, having trialled Trent Alexander-Arnold in midfield and Rico Lewis in a hybrid full-back/midfield role. Expect to see short buildup with central midfield rotations to push a full-back upfield.