Two of the best teams in Europa League this year, meet in the second elimination round, CSKA Moscow and FC Porto.
The Russian topped group Group F with 16 points, achieving 5 victories and a draw. The team was popular for scoring a lot of goals in the group stage, a total of 18 with only 3 conceded. CSKA Moscow scored at least 3 goals in each of their home games, a total of 11 and conceded just 2. The team has met FC Porto twice in the Champions League groups, losing both games, once with 0:2 and once with 0:1.
FC Porto, also topped their group with 16 points, achieving 5 victories and a draw. The team scoring 14 goals in total and conceded 4 in those games. FC Porto did better away from home recording 3 victories, scoring a total of 7 goals and conceding 2. In the four games against CSKA Moscow, Porto hasn’t conceded a single goal.
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While CSKA Moscow’s record against FC Porto seems horrible, let’s not forget that the team won perhaps their most important game on Portuguese soil, the UEFA Cup final in 2005 against Sporting CP, winning it with 3:1.
CSKA Moscow has been unbeaten in 12 home games in UEFA Cup & Europa League, recording 10 victories and 2 draws since their last loss in 2005/06 against Olympique de Marseille.
While this is a 3-way game and basically any of the 3 signs can come up, I’d back CSKA Moscow here for several reasons. First the team has been great at home, achieving a great goal ratio. In my opinion, CSKA’s group had better and more challenging opponents as well, in the faces of Sparta Praha, Palermo and Lausanne-Sport, while Porto had it a bit easier against teams like CSKA Sofia, Beşiktaş JK and Rapid Wien. Yes, CSKA has yet to score a goal against Porto, but I think that this is the game where all that changes.
Recommended Bet:
CSKA Moscow to win @ 2.60 (Bet365)
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