Dinamo – Astra

Interesting clash in the Romanian Liga 1 between two strong, but struggling teams in the form of Dinamo Bucharest and Astra Giurgiu.

Dinamo (7th place) is on the back of a 2-1 win over its second team, Dinamo II, in the Romanian Cup – a circus of a match which was incredibly allowed to happen by the federation. It was the second win in a row for Dinamo after a horrible run of form, but the level of football remains poor and nobody is happy with what’s happening at the club. The midweek win over Dinamo 2 actually seemed to deepen the crisis, as Dinamo was absolutely pathetic and was incredibly outplayed by its second team – being extremely lucky to qualify.

Astra continues to struggle in Liga 1, as the team is on the brink of bankruptcy and players are not paid. Last year’s champions, Astra have not won in 3 rounds and are sitting on the 10th place out of 14 teams. Surprisingly, Astra managed to defeat Viktoria Plzen 2-1 on the road in the Europa League a couple of weeks ago, so they seem to focus better in Europe (where they also knocked out West Ham United).

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Team news & lineups:

Dinamo only misses regular center back Nedelcearu, suspended. Astra misses winger Boudjema and might also miss second choice striker Niculae.

Dinamo: Penedo – Romera, Popescu, Maric, Filip – Nistor, Busuladzic, Palic – Rotariu, Nemec, Lazar

Astra: Lung jr. – Stan, Sapunaru, Oros, Moraes – Seto, Lovin – Kortzorg, Teixeira, Nicoara – Alibec

Regular users know my take on Dinamo Bucharest this season, but please bare with me as I explain the situation once again.

At the start of the season I stated that Dinamo will be involved in a lot of high scoring matches, due to the fact that new manager Ioan Andone is totally incapable of running a defense.

Dinamo played 15 matches this season in all competitions. Both teams scored in 13 of them. There were over 2,5 goals in 10 of them. Dinamo kept just 2 clean sheets. These stats are pretty telling.

Also Dinamo allowed goals against the worst two teams in the league, against the worst offensive team in the league and even against its second team, Dinamo 2!

That being said, I believe this match has an even higher probability than usual to be high scoring.

First of all, Astra is an offensive minded team, just like Dinamo. They have no pressure and can play freely.

Also, at this point Dinamo has no choice but to win games, especially this one at home. A draw would deepen the crisis and the pressure on Ioan Andone will mount, so expect the Red Dogs to take risks.

Lastly, recent meetings clearly suggest that a bet on goals makes sense. The last three meetings (all of them this year) finished 4-1, 4-2 and 4-1. Just a few months ago Dinamo won 4-1 in Giurgiu, in the first round of the season.

I expect a classic Dinamo Bucharest game with good movement and a lot of scoring chances, but also with horrible errors in defense – errors that will most likely be capitalized by Astra’s excellent offensive players. The visitors own the best striker in Romania and a couple of very technical players, so those guys should be able to ruin Dinamo’s shaky back line.

My tip is over 2,5 goals to be scored. Prediction: Dinamo Bucharest – Astra Giurgiu 2-2.

Pick: over 2,5 goals
Odds: 1.99 @ 1xBet
Stake: 8
Possible profit: 7.92
Event date: 29 October