Last season’s 8th placed Malaga CF is ready to open its 2016-17 La Liga campaign with a match against Osasuna. Osasuna is a newly promoted side from Spanish Segunda division and they are hoping to fare well against the “Big teams” in 1st division. First test of their strength will be at the La Rosaleda Stadium, August 19th.
Each team has prepared for the new season differently. Malaga has strengthened their squad with a couple of new signings in Jony, Keko, Kone and Sandro. Their opponents on the other hand struggled to structure a competitive squad for their return in 1st division football.
The home side has brought some new players to their roster (as mentioned before) and are hoping to finish this year’s campaign with a ticket to European competitions. Last year, they sadly just missed 7th place, which would give them a chance to try out in qualifications for this year’s UEFA Euro league. Malaga was just 4 points short of passing 7th placed Sevilla, who despite losing 4 out of 5 last matches in the season kept their 7th position in the league.
All the fans of Malaga know who Juande Ramos is. 61-years old manager has come back to Malaga after 13 years. In that time, he coached Sevilla, Tottenham Hotspur, Real Madrid, CSKA Moscow and Dnipro. On the other hand, the team got rid of 2 players, Raul Albentosa and Duje Cop.
The visiting side has finished their last season at 6th place in Segunda Division, which gave them a chance to play in play-offs where they won against Gimnastic, Giroa and Cordoba. Much of this team’s success can be correlated to their coach, Enrique Monreal, who managed to get his team in 1st division in just 1 year time. Newcomers will be led by Roberto Torres (12 goals last season) and Nino (7 goals last season).
As for previous performances of these teams, Malaga is on a 5 win streak. Actually the record seems even better, if you know they lost only 1 match out of last 10 played. It’s clear Malaga is prepared for the new season and we could expect them to achieve their goal. Osasuna on the other hand has had terrible pre season. They have not tasted victory in 5 matches played and it’s concerning fact to say the least. Coming from 1:5 loss against freshly demoted team Rayo Vallecano it seems 1st division football will a hard task.
VERDICT
Malaga can start their season with 3 points, and I don’t believe they will have a better chance than against Osasuna. I wouldn’t be surprised, if Malaga won by more than just 1 goal, but to be safe my prediction is -0.75 on the home side.
Prediction: Malaga -0.75
Odds: 1.84 SBOBET
