On 16th of January, we are travelling to France, where we will see Monaco hosting Nice at Stade Louis II, where Monaco has not yet won a match in the 9 played.
Monaco are coming into this match as the second to last team in the league with an overall record of 3-5-11 and a 1-1-3 in their last 5 games played. In the course of 19 games, Monaco scored 17 goals and conceded 30, while accumulating only 14 points. They are coming into this match after a draw against Marseille, which was a decent result for Monaco, who are playing terribly this season. Looking at the match against Marseille, Monaco conceded the 1st goal only 13 minutes in, however, managed to respond with a goal of their own in the 38th minute. Those were the only 2 goals in the 1st half, which meant the teams went into the second half levelled at 1:1. The second half was not as entertaining as the 1st one. Marseille had 7 goal attempts and only 1 shot on goal, while Monaco had 3 goal attempts and no shots on goal. Not surprisingly neither side managed to score another goal, which ultimately meant the match ended 1:1. It was an arguably good result for Monaco who are struggling to accumulate points this season. On the other side, Marseille cannot be happy with only 1 point they got against one of the worst teams in the league.
Nice are currently 8th in the league with an overall record of 8-5-6 and a 1-3-1 record in their last 5 games played. Nice was defeated against Strasbourg on 22nd December (2:0) but managed to win the next match against Bordeaux (1:0) on 12th of January. As of now, Nice has 29 points, which is 4 short of reaching the top 4, which is their goal, as it would give them a ticket to compete in the Europa League. Looking at their last match against Bordeaux there was only 1 goal scored in the 16th minute when Nice were awarded a penalty kick, which was converted into a goal. Despite a total of 27 goal attempts and 7 shots on goal from both sides, that was the only goal we saw being scored in the mentioned match. All in all, Bordeaux were the better side with 18 goal attempts and 4 shots on goal, while Nice had only 9 goal attempts and 3 shots on goal. Nonetheless, Nice managed to hold on to the 1 goal lead which got them the 1st win in the last 7 games.
The last time these two teams met each other was on the 16th of January 2018, when the match ended 2:2. This, however, does not give us a good insight into how this match will go, as Monaco are a completely different team to Monaco we were watching last season. With a lot of departures of key players, Monaco are sitting at the bottom of the league instead of being a top 5 team like they used to be. At home stadium, Monaco are currently the worst team in the league with an overall record of 0-3-6, which means they have not won a single home match this season and I am sceptical this will change in the upcoming match. Nice on the other side are 5th best away team with an overall record of 4-3-2. In their last 5 away games, Nice only scored 3 goals and conceded 3, which is the least amount of goals out of all other teams looking solely at the last 5 games. Monaco on the other side scored 4 goals and conceded 12 in their last 5 home games. So what we expect in the upcoming match is yet another tough game for Monaco who clearly fails to protect their net. Luckily they will go against a team that has not been spectacular in the offensive end in their recent matches so a draw here is possible. Still, Nice is a better team and I believe they will manage to win against Monaco.
Prediction: Nice +0.00 Asian Handicap
Odds: 2.43 Matchbook
