Hot streak extends further?
2021-11-17
分享比赛
Czech Republic vs Estonia
The Czechs welcome visitors from Estonia at Generali Ceska Pojistovna Arena in Prague for this interesting, especially betting-wise, FIFA World Cup 2022 qualification match. It will also probably be pretty entertaining as the hosts need goals here and have the players to make that happen. The visitors have already lost their chance to earn a ticket, even for the World Cup extra qualification rounds, organized for the 2nd best team in each group. In reality Estonia, of course, never even had a true chance to qualify. They will place in fourth place in the group. Let's take a closer look at this early Wednesday morning Beijing time match..
The hosts still have, not a good, but decent chance to place second in the group. This scenario requires Wales losing to Belgium at home - the matches are played at the same time on Wednesday - and the Czechs winning today - probably by more than one goal as Wales now have a better goal difference - by two goals and have scored more goals. They also beat the Czechs earlier in this qualification. It is indeed pretty unlikely that Wales would suffer a clear defeat at home, at least not so clear that the Czechs could feel safe if leading by just one goal.. In this scenario - however a narrow win would be enough for the Czechs. The hosts have a clear game plan I believe - the will put huge pressure on Estonia's defense and start scoring as soon as possible! There is in fact long-term data how much extra-motivation for just one of the two teams affects the probabilities in a specific match and this is a factor often not given enough emphasis on. Yes, if Wales lose, even by just one goal's the hosts winning by two goals would take them to second place but I find it hard to believe they would really stop attacking and start defending in this situation. We all know how dangarous a tactic this can be - even if the favorite is the one defending - and stop being aggressive and controlling the ball. Just take a look at what happened to England at the EURO 2020 final versus Italy, after pretty clear domination in the first half. Italy took advantage of England being too cautious in the second half and won the tournement in the end through penalties. Something similar also happened to Netherlands three days ago versus Montenegro as clear favorites - they lost a 2-0 lead late into the match and it was a 2-2 draw.
Even if news from Wales are bad for the Czechs, they are massively better than Estonia and will surely want to thank and entertain their great home fans by scoring as many goals as possible. I must say Estonia have raised their level in recent years though - even robbing a point from Wales away from home a few months ago. However, it was clear Welsh domination and Estonia were pretty lucky in that match. They do defend pretty OK, especially at home. Offensively they are limited to say the least! Let's also remember how good the hosts were in EURO 2020 being the better team in the play offs and against a very good team Netherlands - winning with relative ease in the end. They were also very good against Croatia in the group stage, despite the 1-1 draw and were not dominated even against England, despite the narrow 0-1 defeat. They were eventually beaten by semifinalists Denmark 2-1 but played well in that much too.
To sum up,he Czehs have a good chance to win by at least 3 goals difference. The hosts -2.5 goals handicap is my pick for my fans to extend my awesome run in these World Cup qualification matches!
