Colombia – Uruguay

Odds on Colombia have gone downhill since the news about Luis Suarez being banned, but Uruguay will still hope they can get a result without their superstar.

Colombia has been really impressive in this World Cup. They had an easy group, no doubt about that, but three convincing wins in three games is still a remarkable feat. Colombia showed great versatility, being able to successfully play both positional offense and counterattacks, being effective both on and off the ball. Their defense is the only compartment that showed weakness, but they will have an easier time against Uruguay without Luis Suarez. A quick analysis reveals that only Netherlands scored more goals than Colombia in this tournament.

I am not sold on this Uruguay side. They qualified from a horror group with England and Italy, defeating both teams, but they did not play great football. Uruguay was slow and sluggish against Costa Rica and defeated England and Italy thanks to late goals. Against England they were vastly outplayed, dodged a lot of bullets and only the class of Luis Suarez helped them win 2-1 despite having only 3-4 decent attempts on goal. With Italy, Uruguay played 30+ minutes with an extra man and was clearly helped by the referee, who did not send Suarez off, instead he gave Montolivo Marchisio a controversial red card. Don`t get me wrong, Uruguay is still a quality side, but they are not as good as you might expect from a team that qualified from the group of death. I am 99% positive that they would have gone home if it was not for Suarez.

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Team news & lineups

Colombia does not have any injuries or suspensions. Uruguay will miss Maxi Pereira and Luis Suarez. The latter will be replaced by Forlan, who was dreadful against Costa Rica.

Colombia: Ospina – Zuniga, Zapata, Yepes, Armero – Sánchez, Aguilar – Cuadrado, Rodríguez , Martinez – Gutiérrez.

Uruguay: Muslera – Cácares, Godín, Giménez, Pereira – González, Rios, Rodríguez – Lodeiro – Forlán, Cavani.

Colombia has been clearly superior to Uruguay in terms of the level of football so far, and have been better than them in the South Americans qualifiers as well, finishing with 5 points ahead and winning 4-0 at home (albeit losing 2-0 away). Looking at the two squads, you might argue that Colombia has at least the same individual quality as well, if not better players. Luis Suarez is instrumental for Uruguay’s offense and they will suffer a lot in his absence, it remains to be seen if it impacted morale as well. The odds for Colombia to win might have lost their value, but are still decent and will probably go down even more. I have to go with the team in form, the better team actually, and Colombia might even be a little more fresh, since Uruguay played a grueling match against Italy, while their opponents had an easy time against Japan, resting some players as well. My tip is Colombia to win. I am confident that my Uruguay analysis is fair and they have not played good football, so I trust this bet. Prediction: Colombia – Uruguay 2-1.

Pick: Colombia
Odds: 2.03 @ Pinnacle
Stake: 8
Possible profit: 8.24
Event date: 28 June