Israel's World Cup 2022 qualifying hopes are hanging by a thread as they prepare to take on Austria at Worthersee Stadion in Klagenfurt on Friday evening.
The Blue and Whites are third in Group F, four points behind second-place Scotland with two games to go, while Austria are three points worse off in fourth.
Match preview
© Reuters
Israel came out second best in their huge showdown with Scotland at Hampden Park last month, falling to a stoppage-time tap-in from Scott McTominay.
That result effectively left Willibald Ruttensteiner's side requiring victories in their three remaining games, while also needing a favour from elsewhere.
After beating Moldova 2-1 last time out, Israel must now focus on beating Austria and the Faroe Islands in their remaining two matches.
Even if they do that, however, they still need Scotland to somehow fail to beat bottom side Moldova on Friday and then drop points against Denmark next Monday.
While the visitors do still have an outside chance of finishing in the top two, Austria are now left battling for third place ahead of home games with Israel and Moldova.
Das Team have struggled this campaign, winning just three of their eight Group F matches - two of those against Faroe Islands and one away at another low-ranked nation in Moldova.
Franco Foda's side have a chance of reaching March's playoffs via their UEFA Nations League ranking, but that also depends on results elsewhere over the next week or so.
Austria will just be eager to at least end 2021 on a high by stringing together a couple of wins on the spin, something they last achieved almost a year ago to the day.
- L
- W
- L
- L
- W
- L
- L
- W
- L
- L
- W
- L
- W
- W
- W
- L
- L
- W
- L
- W
- W
- L
- L
- W
Team News
© Reuters
Israel are without injured pair Alexander Schlager and Konrad Laimer for their double-header of November fixtures.
Daniel Bachmann started in goal last time out and will retain his place here, while Laimer's spot in attack will likely be taken by Alessandro Schopf.
Ercan Kara was given the nod up top in the 1-0 loss to Denmark last month, but Marko Arnautovic will be confident of earning a recall to the side.
As for Israel, Sporting Kansas City midfielder Gadi Kinda is their only confirmed absentee for this penultimate Group F match.
Only Netherlands forward Memphis Depay (nine) has more goals in UEFA qualifying than the eight managed by Eran Zahavi, who is set to start alongside Munas Dabbur on Friday.
Austria possible starting lineup:
Bachmann; Trimmel, Harnik, Hinteregger, Alaba; Grillitsch, Ilsanker; Schopf, Sabitzer, Baumgartner; Arnautovic
Israel possible starting lineup:
Marciano; Tibi, Bitton, Dgani; Dasa, Natcho, Peretz, Solomon, Menachem; Dabbur, Zahavi
We say: Austria 1-1 Israel
Scotland's match with Moldova concludes shortly ahead of kickoff in Klagenfurt, so Israel will know whether they have a shot of finishing in the top two before a ball is kicked.
Austria are themselves left waiting on other results to gain backdoor entry to the playoffs, and we can see the sides playing out an uneventful draw in this Group F showdown.
Top tip
Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Austria win with a probability of 51.14%. A win for Israel had a probability of 25.09% and a draw had a probability of 23.8%.
The most likely scoreline for an Austria win was 1-0 with a probability of 9.84%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 2-1 (9.67%) and 2-0 (8.5%). The likeliest Israel win was 0-1 (6.49%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (11.2%). The actual scoreline of 4-2 was predicted with a 1.4% likelihood. Our data analysis correctly predicted that Austria would win this match.
