TFT Issue 188!
FreeHowdy guys and girls!
Featured game
TPS Turku vs KuPS Kuopio – over 2.5 goals at 4/5.
Today’s featured game is the Veikkausliiga encounter between TPS Turku and KuPS Kuopio. Quality-wise, there’s not much between these two sides, perhaps a little contrary to what the league table shows. However, TPS Turku certainly have the advantage here!
I expect I’ll be going against TPS Turku a lot more as the Veikkausliiga campaign continues as the loss of Tarvajarvi up front limits their attacking depth and the loss of N’Galula robs them of a good holding midfielder, which subsequently makes it harder for playmaker Kolehmainen to operate, which has a knock-on effect with TPS Turku scoring goals. The good side of things is that TPS Turku still have two deadly strikers in Aaritalo and Kuqi, especially the former, and given chance then they will score goals. They drew the Turku derby 0-0 last match in a surprisingly droll game and will be looking to bounce back here. TPS Turku are not particularly strong in defence and they don’t pretend to be, either. They do score goals, however – they’ve got dangerous hitmen – so I fancy them to get a positive result here.
However, I’m not going with the home win, rather surprisingly. KuPS Kuopio are actually missing nine players for this game so the home win looks the obvious choice here. I just can’t bring myself to do it, though. My concern lies entirely with the fact that although KuPS are missing a lot of their players, they still have four of their best players in their squad here. Don’t get me wrong here – Nwakaeme is their best striker and he’s absent – but Ilo, Venelainen, Williams, and Udah have all gone to Turku for this game and they’re all dangerous attacking threats so I’m not going to rule them out from sneaking a win here. However, their problems come largely in defence today. We know KuPS really struggle with that ancient art of defending but that should increase tenfold today with the absence of regular defender Holopainen and also Nissinen, who has been a regular in their defence for a couple of months now. Winger Oravainen is absent – that’s another blow for them – but their problems are in defence moreso than attack here.
So yeah – rather than the more obvious home win, I’m going to try and play this a little more cleverly and aim for over 2.5 goals here. These two sides both have the firepower to cause problems and with KuPS missing half their defence, the price that Pinnacle Sports offer (which is a lot longer than any of the other bookies’ odds that I’ve seen for this game!) appeal to me a lot here.
Verdict: Over 2.5 goals at 4/5.
Team news
Finnish Veikkausliiga:
TPS Turku – Kolehmainen is a doubt.
KuPS Kuopio – Oravainen, Holopainen, Nwakaeme, Ollo, Hynynen, Nissinen, Kolari, Pontinen, and Kaivonurmi are absent.
Hungarian Soproni Liga:
Gyori ETO FC – Simon and Dudas are absent.
Zalaegerszegi TE – Bulatovic and Varga are doubts.
Dutch Eredivisie:
AFC Ajax Amsterdam – Ozbiliz, Aissait, Enoh, El Hamdaoui, and Bruno Silva are absent.
Vitesse Arnhem – Room, Snijders, Van Diermen, Pedersen, Velhuizen, and Ibarra are absent.
Norwegian Eliteserien:
Brann Bergen – Baijter and Kalvernes are absent.
Tromso – No news.
Polish Ekstraklasa:
Gornik Zabrze – Jonczyk, Nowak, and Bembenek are absent. Maguera, Olkowski, and Golebiewski return.
Lech Poznan – Arboleda, Kikut, Wojtkowiak, Kielb, and Slusarski are absent. Bruma may debutise.
Zaglebie Lubin – No news.
Cracovia Krakow – Stuart is absent.