Pandurii – CSU Craiova

Pandurii Targu Jiu and CSU Craiova will square off in a match between the two best teams in the Oltenia region, Romania, in the first round of the 2016 / 2017 Liga 1 season.

Pandurii is a good team, they finished 3rd last season in Liga 1, but had some financial problems at the start of the year and lost a few very important players. Still, despite these problems, Pandurii managed to bring in some excellent replacements, so the squad is not much weaker than last season. The bigger issue for Pandurii is that they lost their excellent manager, Edi Iordanescu, bringing in Petre Grigoras, who coached the team in the past with great success – but his career went into a downward spiral in the last few years.

CSU Craiova is one of the few teams in Romania that have financial stability (though they did have some problems with the law), as they are supported by the City Hall. Despite this, they have struggled last year to finish 8th and the squad doesn`t look much better this year either. Craiova also has a new coach, Gigi Multescu, a guy that us used to fight against relegation. The club made some signings, but the quality of the players is doubtful and most of them are not ready for this first match of the season.

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Lineups:

Pandurii: Stanca – Ungurusan, Vasiljevic, Bunoza, Acsinte – Obodo, Mrzljak – Herea, Voiculet, Armiche – Hora

Craiova: Calancea – Dumitras, Popov, Acka, Vatajelu – Zlatinski, Mateiu – Baluta, Nuno Rocha, Bancu – Ivan

It`s the first round of the season, both sides have new managers and shuffled their squads a bit. I can see both sides approaching this one in a tentative manner, playing it safe at least at the start in order to asses both their opponent’s strength and their own.

There have been 4 meetings between these two sides in their history, all of them in the last two seasons. All matches were close, tight, ugly and low scoring: 1-1, 1-0, 0-0, 1-1. Last season both meetings ended with draws. If nothing unexpected happens, today’s match should follow the same scenario – a low scoring, close game that could well end with a draw.

My tip is a draw at half time, after much consideration I think this is the best bet – given the fact that the two sides are likely to start slow due to it being the first match of the season, also due to the coaching and roster changes. Prediction: Pandurii – CSU Craiova 1-1 (0-0 half time).

Pick: Half time draw
Odds: 2.00 @ Bet365
Stake: 6
Possible profit: 6
Event date: 22 July