Netherlands vs Scotland Prediction: Entertaining friendly forecast in Amsterdam

The Netherlands and Scotland begin preparations for Euro 2024 with a match at the Johan Cruyff Arena in Amsterdam on Friday evening (KO, 19:45).

Below is all the latest team news and match odds ahead of this international friendly, as well as our Netherlands vs Scotland prediction.

Team News

Georginio Wijnaldum (Al Ettifaq) is back in the Netherlands set-up after a year out of the picture and it's a similar story for Memphis Depay (Atletico Madrid) who was previously sidelined through injury.

Quinten Timber (Feyenoord) - brother of Arsenal defender Jurrien - has been named in the squad for the first time but Brian Brobbey (Ajax) has withdrawn due to an injury.

Virgil van Dijk (Liverpool), Matthijs de Ligt (Bayern Munich) and Xavi Simons (RB Leipzig) are some of the other big-name players expected to feature on Friday.

Andy Robertson (Liverpool) and Kieran Tierney (Real Sociedad, on loan from Arsenal) have returned to the Scotland squad after injuries kept them out of the last internationals, and the duo are joined by goalkeeper Craig Gordon (Heart of Midlothian) who is back from a long-term absence.

Grant Hanley (Norwich City) was originally called up after a long lay-off with an Achilles injury but the 32-year-old has been forced to withdraw from the squad.

Lewis Ferguson (Bologna) will be among those looking to impress head coach Steve Clarke after a superb 2023/24 campaign in Serie A, where he has captained his club side to Champions League contention.

Match Odds

The Netherlands are 2/5 to record a fourth consecutive victory - and a sixth in their last seven - on Friday, while Scotland can be backed at 6/1 to claim a first success over the Dutch since 2003.

The last meeting between these sides finished 2-2 in June 2021 and another stalemate is available at 3/1. Both teams to score is 6/5 and over 2.5 goals is 10/11.

Both teams to score @ 6/5

These nations are both frequent scorers on the international scene. The Netherlands have found the net in each of their last nine games, a run stretching back to March 2023, while Scotland have scored in 10 of their last 11, with only Spain managing to shut them out last October.

Considering this is a friendly, and a chance to try new things out, I expect there to be even less emphasis on defence and that should lend itself to an entertaining game.

Ronald Koeman's side will want to extend their run of three straight games with a clean sheet to four, but Scotland will be confident of finding a way past the Oranje after hitting three past Norway in their last international and scoring against all of France, England and Spain last year.

Over 3.5 goals @ 5/2

Four of Scotland's last five matches have produced four goals or more, including friendlies against France (1-4) and England (1-3).

Goals have been harder to come by in games featuring the Dutch; before their 6-0 win over minnows Gibraltar last time out, they played five straight matches where the maximum number of goals scored in one was three.

The Netherlands have only played two friendlies since the start of 2022, but one of them was a six-goal thriller against Denmark in March of that year, where they prevailed 4-2 in Amsterdam.

I think Friday's fixture is more likely to be in that mould with the likes of Donyell Malen (Borussia Dortmund) and Lawrence Shankland (Hearts) in good goalscoring form for their respective clubs.

Check out the rest of our Football Betting Tips here.