Spain

Switzerland's reward for eliminating pre-tournament favorite France is a matchup with another modern European power. The Swiss have to deal with a Spain side that has suddenly found its goal-scoring form over the last two games. Spain's five goals in 120 minutes against Croatia should mean more to this matchup than the five-goal thrashing of lowly Slovakia to finish the group stage because of the quality of opponents. Five different Spanish players found the back of the net in the round of 16. Even Alvaro Morata, who has struggled at times to score for La Roja, bagged his second goal of the tournament in that contest. La Furia Roja's confidence in attack should be high, but they could feel nervy at the back after letting Croatia score two goals in the final five minutes of normal time on Monday. Spain's two clean sheets at Euro 2020 came from its opening Group E match against Sweden in which it had 75 percent of the possession in a 0-0 draw and in the thrashing of Slovakia. Switzerland's defense has not been perfect, either. It let in three goals against Italy in Group A, and it was torn apart by the French in the second half on Monday. Despite those concessions, Switzerland displayed plenty of resilience to get into the knockout rounds and to advance to the final eight. The Swiss rallied from the loss to Italy by scoring a pair of first-half goals in a 3-1 win over Turkey, and they put in two late tallies to equalize against France and send the game to extra time before winning on penalties. Haris Seferovic has been the danger man up top for the Swiss. He is tied for third in the Golden Boot race and carries plenty of confidence off a 22-goal season with Benfica. Steven Zuber should be providing the service from the flanks. He has been one of the underrated stars of the tournament with four assists, and he also earned a penalty in the France victory that wasn't converted. The distance traveled between venues in such a short space of time might have an effect on the players. Switzerland played in Baku and Bucharest, respectively, in their previous two games, while Spain's trip to Copenhagen was nearly 3,000 miles away from their Seville base camp. A trip to St. Petersburg in Russia for the quarterfinals will not be welcomed by either side. If you add in the short turnaround and the 120 minutes both teams played on Monday, we could either see a wide-open affair with tired defenses or a drab one- or two-goal encounter. Morata rounding into some form and Spain's supporting cast carrying confidence could be enough of a difference-maker to power through to the semifinals. Prediction: Spain 3, Switzerland 1