4-4 Saturday +7.7 units
Posted February
32-1-40 -24.05 units
Real Sociedad @1.87 (6 units)
The ranks 5 and 6 of LaLiga will face each other in the Estadio Anoeta. Both teams are fighting to keep up for a place in Europe next year. Real Sociedad still have a solid chance of direct qualification for the Champions League group stage, whereas is down 4 points on them and is most likely going for rank 5 this year.
Real Sociedad
Erreala are in fine form recently. In the past 4 months they've gathered the same amount of points as Real Madrid & Barcelona.
In the last 5 games they've scored 8 and conceded 6 goals (4W-1L). The loss was against Real Madrid (3-0).
Real Sociedad are a side that play excellent football being able to constantly put pressure on teams. In my opinion they are currently on the same level as Real Madrid & Barcelona as far as field play.
They have had some troubles with their defense costing them quite a lot of goals against but this was merely at the start of the season. The past few months the whole team have been doing much much better.
They've also won 64% of their home games this season scoring 1.70 average goals per game.
Last month they pretty much demolished Villareal in the Copa Del Rey beating them with 3-1.
Big man to watch currently is former Arsenal player Carlos Vela.
A big miss for Erreala however is the missing of club topscorer Willian Jose due to an injury. However. I do think they have a good back-up for him in Juanmi.
Villareal
El Submarino Amarillo are in poor form, having only won 1 out of their last 10 games. Biggest issue without a doubt is their offense.
29 goals in 22 matches is just not good enough for a (sub)top-club.
In the last 5 games they've scored 3 and conceded 3 goals (1W-3D-1L). We should note that 1 win 2 draws & 1 loss of those have been against clubs around or in the relegation zone.
Last thursday Villareal have had an horrible night at their home ground losing 0-4 to As Roma. That will certainly not boost their morale. Defending wise they haven't been doing bad at all in LaLiga but if you can't score goals you will drop points it's that simple.
In general I don't like their current play, they have a hard time playing ball possession game. When you face a team like Real Sociedad who play good ball possession game and can put great amounts of pressure on a team for the whole game. That is going to be a problem. If Villareal gets a goal against I can hardly see them coming back leveled seen the lack of firepower they have up front.
I expect a Real Sociedad that will control the game and have constant pressure on Villareal's defense. They have the quality to crack down the yellow wall. This is the chance for Real Sociedad to take a 8 point lead between them and Villareal and also keep their hopes alive of playing Champions League next year. They still have a solid chance of ending third/fourth in LaLiga this season.
But a win over Villareal is key for that.