Finland vs Malta Prediction 15 November 2025

🔊 Can Malta secure their first victory in the 2026 World Cup qualifiers? This Friday, the national team has a chance as they travel to face their group rivals in Finland. Both teams have already lost their chances of qualifying for the World Cup, so now they focus on achieving local objectives. We've prepared a detailed analysis of the current form of both teams and made a prediction on the outcome of this matchup.

Head-to-Head

📊 Over the past five years, these teams have faced each other just once, during the current qualifying cycle for the 2026 World Cup. In that encounter, Finland's national team emerged victorious with a narrow 1-0 win.

Finland Team Overview

🔵 Finland's national team has lost even the theoretical chance of securing a spot in the 2026 World Cup. Currently, the "white and blues" sit third in qualifying Group G, trailing Poland by three points. Even if Finland manages to win their final match and draw level on points with Poland, they would still fall short due to tiebreakers (head-to-head results and goals scored in those matches).

⚪ It's worth noting that Finland had a relatively strong qualifying campaign and were even seen as contenders ahead of Poland for the second spot after their home victory (2-1) against them. However, they lost the return fixture by a larger margin (1-3), dashing all hopes of reaching the playoffs. In the last round, Jakob Friis's squad suffered a heavy away defeat to the Netherlands (0-4).

Malta Team Overview

⚪ Malta didn't harbor any grand illusions about qualifying for the World Cup, so their journey through the qualifiers unfolded in a familiar manner. On the bright side, they managed to secure two points in their encounters with Lithuania: a 0-0 draw at home and a 1-1 draw away. Additionally, with a goal difference of -15, it's not the worst outcome for Emilio De Leo's squad.

🔴 On the downside, Malta suffered two heavy defeats against the Netherlands (0-4 and 0-8). But there's little one can do when facing such a disparity in team quality. With two matches remaining in the World Cup qualifiers, Malta sit at the bottom of the standings, trailing Lithuania by just a single point. Could they make a bold statement and aim to leapfrog their rivals?

Latest news

Finland

🎩 Finnish football legend and all-time top scorer Teemu Pukki has decided to retire from international duty after the conclusion of the 2026 World Cup qualifiers. The 35-year-old forward will play his final match for the national team in November, after which he will focus on his club career. Currently, Teemu Pukki plays for HJK in the Finnish league. The star striker has earned 131 caps for the national team, scoring 42 goals.

❌ Monaco goalkeeper Lukas Hradecky remains sidelined for Finland due to a knee injury sustained during the third round of the French league. Additionally, Rosenborg midfielder Santeri Väänänen will be unable to assist his teammates due to an injury.

Malta

❌ Malta have no injured players. All the footballers Emilio De Leo wanted to see in the starting lineup are fit and ready to challenge Finland in the upcoming match.

🟨 Referee and Yellow Cards

🟨 Referee and Yellow Cards

The upcoming match will be officiated by Julian Weinberger from Austria. Over the course of 100 matches, he averages 4.22 yellow cards per game, with 29 fouls. In the 2026 World Cup qualifiers, the yellow card stats for the teams are as follows: Finland averages 1.3 per game, while Malta averages 3.2. In this qualifying cycle, Malta have received significantly more cautions than their opponents, suggesting a bet on the visitors to win the yellow card count could be worthwhile.

⚽️ Goal Prediction

Finland's average individual total in the qualifiers stands at 1.1 goals per match, whereas Malta manage just 0.2. In their past head-to-head encounter, these teams combined for just one goal. Considering this data, we suggest a wager on total match goals under 3.5.

🚩 Corner Prediction

In the 2026 World Cup qualifiers, Finland average 3 corners per game, while Malta have 2.7. Both teams rarely utilize the flanks for attacking plays and have limited shots on goal, making corner kicks a rarity for them. We recommend considering a bet on total corners under 8.5.

While the teams can't achieve major objectives in this qualifying cycle, they can certainly finish on a positive note. Given Malta's less-than-stellar performance in the qualifiers, we anticipate a home win for Finland with a scoreline of 2-0. Both teams have struggled with goal-scoring, as confirmed by their previous head-to-head encounter. We suggest considering a bet on total goals under 3.5.