Stadium: Gazprom Arena (Saint Petersburg)
Zenit and Malmo started this season’s UEFA Champions League with defeats. Who will get their first points from this encounter? We predict that the Russian club will win comfortably!
Zenit
Zenit are having another solid season in the domestic arena. Already, they have made a solid bid for a fourth consecutive championship, as in nine meetings held, they were able to win seven victories with two draws, which allows them to be ahead of their nearest neighbor in the standings by four points. Alas, in the Champions League again, everything goes very hard, and the problem began with the draw when they got Chelsea and Juventus. Semak’s charges played decently against the London club, with the scoreline standing at zero until the 69th minute, but then the reigning titleholders scored a 0-1 defeat for Zenit.
Malmo
Malmo are the reigning champions of Sweden, and now they have to fight hard on two fronts. Besides playing in the Champions League, the Sky Blue have unfinished business in the local league, which has already crossed its equator. They are currently only second in the table, three points behind the leader. Jon-Dahl Tomasson’s side has problems picking Zenit, Chelsea, and Juventus in the same group in the European competition, with the Italian club coming to Sweden in terrible condition. Still, even that did not stop them from scoring an easy 3-0 win, with the Black and Whites scoring all three goals in the first half before Malmö were unable to offer any counterplay.
Expert Betting Tips
Malmo are the reigning Swedish champions, but they are only in second place in the current championship. They have serious defensive problems even by the standards of the domestic league, where the average performance is low. In 21 meetings played, the Sky Blue have already conceded 24 goals (1.14 goals per game on average), which at first glance is not too bad, except that this figure is the eighth in the top flight. Less conceded goals are, for instance, Halmstad and Mjallby, who sit 11th and 13th, respectively. Of course, the Russian club players must take advantage of all that, so the best option for the prediction seems to be Individual Total 1 Over 1.5 goals for 1.64.
Russian clubs so rarely win in European competitions that even matches against Malmö are to be expected with serious apprehension. It would seem that the Zenit are bound to pick up an easy three points here, but the anxiety is still present. Sergey Semak’s charges are in good form. Their only defeat this season was at the hands of Chelsea, and that with a narrow score, while the Swedish champions conceded three goals in the first half against a struggling Juventus and lost heavily on the same day. As a result, it is worth taking a risk and bet on Zenit’s victory with a handicap (-1.5) for 2.57.
Artem Dzyuba after the unsuccessful European Championship, was very difficult to enter the new season, for a long time, could not show any productive actions and even fell out of the main Zenit squad. Judging by the latest games, the 33-year-old striker began to find himself, as he scored three goals and three assists in the previous four meetings in the local championship. Such a productive game of the player led to the fact that even Valeri Karpin included him in the expanded squad of the Russian national team, but the player himself refused. Nevertheless, he is doing a lot right now, so a bet on Artem Dzyuba’s goal is worth taking a closer look at 2.25.
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