Olympic Marseille hosts Jock in the UEFA Champions LeagueIt’s the third round. The French powerhouse and the former European champion have high hopes for this season, but so do the Lisbon Lions. At the moment, Sporting are top of Group D with six points from two games, while on the other side, Marseille are dead last with no points or goals scored. If they lose Tuesday’s contest, the France team could easily end their international adventure, which means a victory is an absolute must in this case.
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Insight
Olympic Marseille (+115) sacked Angers this Friday, 0-3 away, which was a huge boost in morale before Tuesday. Igor Tudor’s side posted mixed results before the break, swinging a lot and failing to find the right rhythm that would consistently earn them UEFA Champions League points.
The performance in Ligue 1 so far hasn’t been bad at all and Olympique haven’t lost a single game, claiming seven wins and two draws. Still, before beating Angers, they would only get one win in four encounters, defeats in UCL spoiling the impression.
The previous two events at the Vélodrome saw Marseille lose to Eintracht, 0-2, and play 1-1 against Rennes. Prior to those two games, they would win four in a row. The Tudor team plays very well at home thanks to 60,000 enthusiastic fans creating a great atmosphere. However, it sometimes puts pressure on hosts who don’t live up to expectations, like against Eintracht.
Sporting Lisbon (+225) opened the season with just one win in the first four games, and at the time it looked like the Lions would not be a competitive team. However, since the beginning of September, Ruben Amorim has managed to wake up his crew, which has recorded five victories and one defeat.
Among those triumphs, we saw the Lions beat Eintracht away, 0-3 and Tottenham at home, 2-0, which put them top of the group, opening the door to the knockout stage.
When Sporting play, you usually see moderate efficiency, 2 or 3 goals, and goals from only one end of the field, since seven of the last nine games have ended like this. On the road, the Lions have two wins and two losses, plus a draw, with the previous four all ending with 2 or 3 scores.
Recent news
Sead Kolasinac is injured for the hosts and he won’t be ready for this game.
On the other side, Braganca, Neto and Cabral are out for Tuesday’s clash.
head to head games
The two teams had friendlies in 2017, when Marseille won, 2-1, and a year later, which ended in a draw, 1-1.
Prediction
It’s going to be a tough game with a cautious approach from both teams. Sporting will try to slow down the pace and tempo on the pitch as they wouldn’t mind taking a point at the Velodrom. Meanwhile, the hosts also need to avoid any surprises in front of their net, and all of this will lead to Tuesday’s game being low efficiency, that is, under 2.5 goals. We hesitated a little, because we couldn’t decide between this choice and the two teams not to score.
Pick: Under 2.5 goals -110
Nikola Velickovic is a sports journalist who enjoys writing and reading about all sports. Nikola contributes to both news updates and sports news editor duties at WagerBop.
