Let’s start with the obvious, Good Friday is not Boxing Day. While we have had a week packed with excitement in CL, EL and ECL, today there is a bit of a pause in all the action for most football lovers. But don’t worry too much. Good Friday might not be great or even Good when it comes to big games, but there are quite a few coming up already tomorrow.
Anyway, let’s stay in the present and look at what we have on the menu for today. My eyes stop at La Ligue and the battle between Rennes and Nantes. Two teams that are both quite stuck in the middle, or even lower middle, of the table. Neither of them on totally safe ground, but Nantes only three points away from the seats with risk for relegation. The risk for low energy and unmotivated teams should be eliminated for the match, and that is one of my prerequisites for considering a bet or two.
This match could effectively take Rennes into the clear for the season, a win would more or less make relegation mathematically impossible. That is quite a motivator for the home team. On the other hand, Nantes plays with a knife to their throats, losing 3 points to Rennes puts the team in a difficult spot. The form curves for both teams display a scrambled image, mixing wins, losses and draws in an equal fashion. The only real distinguishing factor is that Rennes come straight from a massive 5-1 win against Le Havre, injecting self confidence to the squad. In terms of injuries and suspensions. Rennes will have to do without two strong cards, Blas and Seidu, but they have a strong enough squad to cover for the loss. And on the positive side, the team enters the pitch with a Kalimuendo back from Franch U21 duties, holding a great streak in terms of goals and assists.
Nantes on their hand come to the game with a midfield suffering from having to do without Coquelin and Chirivella, something which could prove a fatal set-back. On the positive side is that Castelletto returns from a two-match suspension. Conclusion: Balancing plus and minuses from for curves and squad news, strengthens my belief in the home team’s ability to collect all three points at stake. Adding some excitement to that prediction can be done by looking at stats for number of goals in the last appearances for both teams. These stats display games with 3+ goals in almost each and every game.
Considering the above, my prediction is quite easy to formulate. Rennes wins and there will be over 2,5 goals in the match.
