This will be England and Serbia’s first encounter since the latter re-emerged as an independent state in 2006. In fact, since the breakup of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s, England have only faced Serbia and Montenegro once in 2003, winning 2-1 in an international friendly.
England are unbeaten in their last six matches against Serbia/Yugoslavia, winning each of their last four. Their last defeat was against Yugoslavia in the semi-finals of EURO 1968.
As an independent nation, Serbia have qualified for a UEFA EURO tournament for the first time. They competed as Yugoslavia and FR Yugoslavia in five editions previously, finishing as runners-up on two occasions in 1960 and 1968.
Serbia’s most recent UEFA EURO finals appearance was in 2000 as FR Yugoslavia, reaching the quarter-finals before losing 6-1 to the Netherlands. It remains the only time a nation has conceded six goals in a UEFA EURO match.
33% of Serbia’s goals in UEFA EURO 2024 qualifying were headers (5 out of 15), the highest ratio amongst any team that have reached the finals in Germany.
England are taking part in their 11th UEFA European Championship – no team has played as many games in the tournament without ever winning it (38 matches).
Penalty shoot-outs excluded, England have lost only one of their last 18 games at the European Championship (W10 D7) – it was against Iceland in the round of 16 of the 2016 edition (1-2).
England topped their UEFA EURO 2024 qualifying group with 20 points, six ahead of Italy in second place, winning six and drawing two games. It is the eighth consecutive major qualifying group they have finished in first place, since failing to qualify for EURO 2008 after coming third in that qualifying campaign.
No European player has scored more goals than England’s Harry Kane across the last three major international tournaments, 12 in total (6 at WC 2018, 4 at EURO 2020, 2 at WC 2022). The only other player to match that tally is France’s Kylian Mbappé.
Head-coach Gareth Southgate will be leading England at a fourth major tournament after World Cup 2018 (4th place), EURO 2020 (2nd) and World Cup 2022 (quarter-finalists). At Euro 1996, he was one of only three England players to play all 510 minutes alongside David Seaman and Tony Adams – he missed a penalty in the semi-final shoot-out against Germany.
Current head-coach Dragan Stojković has made the most appearances of any Serbian player at the UEFA EURO finals, playing seven times across the 1984 and 2000 tournaments for Yugoslavia, scoring once.