Europa League
2011-09-29 - Maribor vs Birmingham City
A Sports Betting Pick by Auls
Football : Europa League Match Day 2
Thursday 29 September 2011 - Kickoff 6pm
This game is live on TV
Maribor
The Slovenian Champions were not quite good enough to get through to the Group Stages of that competition, but they have already beaten a club from the United Kingdom in reaching the Group Stages of the Europa League after knocking out Rangers 3-2 on aggregate.
Maribor are leading their domestic League after starting the season with a 6-3-2 record from their opening 11 games. They have proved tough to beat at home, going 4-1-1 while scoring 15 goals and only conceding 6. Maribor are 1-1-0 at home in Europe so far, scoring 3 goals and conceding 2.
The team have not been in good form with only 1 win in their last 7 games in all competitions, including a 2-0 loss to Club Brugge to open this Group. Maribor had been unbeaten in 13 games at home in all competitions before losing 0-2 to Nafta at the weekend- ironically the last team to beat them at home was also Nafta.
Maribor are unbeaten in 6 home games in Europe, winning 5 of those.
Birmingham City
Birmingham City are already playing catch up in the Championship this season, both in terms of games played as well as points if they want to make a swift return to the Premier League. Chris Hughton made it clear that losing in the Carling Cup was not that disappointing, and I think the Europa League is another distraction they could do without.
The Blues are 19th in the Championship having picked up just 8 points in their first 7 games of the season, but they have played 1, and in some cases 2, games less than many of the other teams in the Championship that had a full midweek schedule. Birmingham are 0-1-3 away from home, scoring 5 goals and conceding 11.
They don't come into this game with much confidence having failed to win any of their last 4 games in all competitions, although they earned a 1-1 draw with Barnsley at the weekend that stopped a run of 3 consecutive defeats. Birmingham have failed to win any of their last 13 away games in all competitions and they have lost 4 of their 6 games this season, conceding at least 2 goals in 5 of those games.
Curtis Davies and Stephen Carr have both been ruled out, while Nikola Zigic is a doubt. A couple of the youngsters have been taken with the squad to Slovenia.
Prediction
I am going to favour Maribor to come through this match with the win as they have a very good home record recently and are playing a Birmingham team that might already be concentrating on improving their League form rather than an extended European run.
Birmingham have also struggled defensively in their away games this season and it looks like a decent option picking the home side to win at odds against.
The Pick :
Maribor 2-1 Birmingham City
