More stuff for today:
Soccer World Cup Play: Uruguay vs. Costa Rica
Uruguay is considered to be one of the dark horses of this tournament due to their great results in the last years: they were 4th in the last World Cup and they won the Copa America in the following year. They are an experienced team with a great national coach and probably, they have the best front two duos in the competition in Luis Suarez and Edison Cavani.
The potential problem is that Luis Suarez is coming from an injury and he might be far from being @ 100%. Uruguay doesn’t have much talent on their midfield, so they need badly Suarez to create open-plays for them.
On the other end, Costa Rica will just be happy to packed in and hope for the best in a counter move. Most likely, they will use a 5-3-2 formation and note that they are a well organized and disciplined team. Their Goalkeeper is coming from a great individual season in Spain (Levante) so it’s not going to be easy to break them and score goals.
My leans for this contest are Costa Rica & Under. I would love to grab an AH (+1.5) line but this won’t happen for sure as I expect Uruguay to have some problems to create chances and therefore, my lean w/ Under makes sense as well IMO.
Obviously, if Uruguay scores an early game (like Colombia did against Greece today) we would be in trouble, because Costa Rica will have the pressure to abandon their defensive mindset to tie the game and naturally, they will be exposed on the back, but I'll take my chances in a low scoring game
Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on Under 2.25 Goals @ -121 / 1.83 on Pinnacle Sports (OR -127 / 1.79 on Betonline)
Soccer World Cup Preview: England vs. Italy
IMPORTANT NOTE: This contest will be played in Manaus, Amazonia! We are talking about tropical heat w/ humidity up to 80%! We can expect both team players to be exhausted in the second half…
England has been a major disappointment in the last tournaments while their expectations are always high. However, this isn’t happening for this World Cup! Usually, their players are exhausted going for this type of tournaments as the English Premier League is brutal physically and demands a ton of energy. The good news for them is that their team is young and his NT coach is tempting to use 5 Liverpool players who didn’t play any game in the European competitions, so they will be relatively “fresh” for this WC and they can surprise everyone.
It looks like Buffon is OUT for this contest and this could be a key factor as Buffon is still one of the best keepers of the world. This is basically the same team that went to the Final of EURO2012: strong defense (Juventus based) and everything works around Pirlo in the midfield. Balotelli and especially Immobile are scoring threats who can play in the channels and benefit from Pirlo’s world class through passes.
I had a small lean w/ England but they are already slight favorites in this contest = no VALUE! A potential DRAW is also tempting especially if the game is tied midway second half – both teams won’t have the proper legs and mind to be assertive due to the extreme weather conditions.