PICK OF THE DAY
Japan - Poland
Tip : 3+ (over 2.5)
Odd : 2.20
FT : ??
Group H of the World Cup was seen by many as the hardest one to predict, and that has turned out to be the case. The pre-tournament favourites for qualification, Colombia and Poland, both sit outside the top two. Colombia still have a great chance of making it to the knockout stages, but two defeats from two leave Poland out of the World Cup and heading home in disappointment.
Japan, on the other hand, are in prime position to make it through to the last 16. They managed to beat a Colombia side who were reduced to ten men in the first five minutes in their opener. They scored the resulting penalty but then looked very poor as they sat back despite having a numerical advantage, but they reacted well to conceding Quintero’s equaliser and came out firing in the second half. Yuyi Osako netted the winner to put Japan in an excellent position.
They followed this with a much improved performance against Senegal, twice coming from behind to equalise thanks to the heroics of Takashi Inui and veteran Keisuke Honda. This puts them ahead of the Africans, but only on the FIFA Fair Play ruling due to picking up less cards than Senegal.
However, they will feel fairly confident of getting a result against Poland here. The only European nation in the group have been terrible so far, deservedly losing to Senegal thanks to a dreadful backpass from Gregorz Krychowiak and then getting hammered 3-0 by Colombia on Sunday.
Defensively they look all at sea, and while centre back lynchpin Kamil Glik is recovering from injury, he’s unlikely to be fully fit in time for Thursday’s game. Japan, meanwhile, have looked very well orchestrated when they do venture forward.
Poland seem to have issues dealing with the main striker of the opposition. Niang netted for Senegal thanks to his tireless play, and Radamel Falcao managed to find the net for Colombia too. With this in mind, Japan’s surprisingly impressive Yuyi Osako looks the best choice for our anytime goalscorer predictions.
As far as the overall result goes, I can see plenty of goals in this game. Poland will be looking for some level of redemption, but having conceded five goals in two games they are clearly vulnerable at the back. Japan have looked very shaky at the back as well though, and considering all four of these teams’ combined matches have seen at least three goals we like the look of Over 2.5 Goals.
Japan have the incentive and the form to take the three points though, so we’re also backing a Japan Win and Both Teams to Score along with a 2-1 correct score predictions.
Japan Predicted Lineup: Kawashima, Sakai, Yoshida, Shoji, Nagatomo, Hasebe, Shibasaki, Haraguchi, Kagawa, Inui, Osako
Poland Predicted Lineup: Szczesny, Piszczek, Pazdan, Bednarek, Rybus, Krychowiak, Zielinski, Blaszczykowski, Kownacki, Milik, Lewandowski
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