51 matches over four weeks of competition, but just one winner. One team will take glory in France this summer but one local school will also be crowned champions in the Echo’s predictions competitions. Six schools will take on each other and the Echo sports desk over the next four weeks, with each school assigned a group to predict and all predicting the knock-out matches.

But who will be the winner?

There are some big-hitters in Group D, with defending champions Spain joined by Croatia, Turkey and the Czech Republic, all of which are more than capable of qualifying for the knock-out rounds of the competition. But Whitmore Primary are struggling to look past Spain…

Here is what Harry, Tawana, Sol, Dammy, Ronnie, Rhys C, Rhys K and Bobby had to say.

Echo reporter Luke: This is a pretty good group guys. What do you think?

Dammy: Spain will win this group easily.

Tawana: Spain have the best team and they are the defending champions.

Harry: Spain have (David) De Gea and he is so good, the others won’t score past him.

Rhys C: Spain play as a team which is really important in these big games.

Sol: Yeah, and they have fun while playing, like us.

Ronnie: Croatia aren’t bad. They have (Mario) Mandžukić and he is a beast.

Bobby: Turkey aren’t great are they, although they did OK against England (narrowly lost 2-1), and Croatia have (Ivan) Rakitic and he is sick. So both of those could do well.

Rhys K: I don’t see the Czech Republic causing many problems. They only have (Petr) Cech in goal so they will get beaten probably.

It has been 20 years since Gareth Southgate’s agonising penalty miss in Euro 96, so can England finally show the rest of the world what they are capable of in a major championship?

Ronnie: They might get to the semi-finals and that wouldn’t be too bad.

Rhys C: Slovakia have some good players and Wales have (Gareth) Bale who can win a game on his own though.

Sol: We have (Jamie) Vardy though and he is going to be great.

Ronnie: I think he will be the top scorer in the Euros.

Tawana: We have good strikers and we have (Marcus) Rashford who has been really good this year.

Rhys C: Yeah, Rashford is a beast, he should go.

Bobby: I tell you who shouldn’t go – Jack Wilshere, he is so slow. No pace!

Luke: Interesting! Thanks guys.

The scoring: We have asked Great Berry Primary School, Whitmore Primary School, Hadleigh Junior School and William Read Primary School to join 2014 World Cup prediction winners Holt Farm Junior School and Rayleigh Primary School in this year’s Euro 2016 competition.

Schools will be given three points for predicting the correct score line and one for the correct result. So who will come out on top this time?

GROUP D ECHO V WHITMORE PRIMARY

SUNDAY: Turkey v Croatia – Whitmore 1-2, Echo 1-1

MONDAY: Spain v Czech Republic – Whitmore 2-0, Echo 2-0

17/6: Czech Republic v Croatia – Whitmore 0-1, Echo 1-3

17/6: Spain v Turkey – Whitmore 2-0, Echo 2-1

21/6: Croatia v Spain – Whitmore 1-1, Echo 0-1

21/6: Czech Republic v Turkey – Whitmore 1-0, Echo 0-0