Fabien Frei(credit: wikipedi)
Wales take on Switzerland tonight.
Gary Speed has been the Wales manager for a year and in that time the side have been steadily improving. They may only have won two matches but in competitive matches the former Sheffield United boss has claimed one victory and two defeats.
The losses were home and away to England, which is far from embarrassing, and they sandwiched a very impressive win over Montenegro. The supporters will, therefore, go into this week's international double header fairly confident that they will see some positive performances from a young Wales side.
And they will. Any team that contains Gareth Bale, Aaron Ramsey, Joe Allen and Craig Bellamy will play with pace and energy. The Premier League stars will help Wales to attack Switzerland in the Millennium Stadium on Friday and it is 7/2, at
bet365, that the home side manage to claim a victory.
Unfortunately, the match may come a little early for Speed's side. While there are plenty of reasons to be cheerful about Welsh football, the squad is still far away from being ready to compete at the top level of international football. This is where Switzerland are, having played at the 2010 World Cup.
Ottmar Hitzfeld's side may not have had the best Euro 2012 qualifying campaign but they can still reach the playoffs, if they beat Wales on Friday, at odds of 3/4, and then win against Montenegro in Basel on Tuesday.
That is an achievable goal for a team ranked 18th in the world by FIFA and who possess players of the calibre of Xherdan Shaqiri (who lit up last year's Under-21 championships) and Fabien Frei (who was influential for FC Basel against Manchester United last week).
The young Swiss side outplayed England for much of their match at Wembley in June and they are clearly a class above Wales. It should be a routine victory for a side which will be high on motivation and there may even be some value in backing the visitors to win by two or more goals, at odds of 21/10. The fact that Switzerland won 4-1 the last time the teams met further enhances the prospect of this pick.
Recommendation
Win Market - Wales (3/4,
bet365)