Champions League Group Stage Week 1 Free Premium Play: FC Porto @ Austria Wien

 

FC Porto @ Austria Wien

Game Time: Wednesday, 2:45 PM EST

FC Porto is one of the most experienced teams in Europe and their consistency on their structure over the last few years help them a lot. Their main strength is their world-class defense, with great individual talent on this unit, something always quite important on road games. Their offense might not have the same individual quality that it once had, but it has a better work rate and a super reliable scorer in the world class striker Jackson Martinez.

The Portuguese champions will face possibly the worst team in the CL group stage this season. Austria Wien qualified for the group stage over Dinamo Zagreb, even though they were completely outplayed by the Croatian team at home, in a game where they lost by 2-3. However, they were still able to advance due to a road win on the first leg. By the way, FC Porto faced Dinamo Zagreb in last year's group stage and completely dominate them with a 2-0 win in Croatia and a 3-0 win in Portugal. 

Things aren't working well for Austria Wien on the domestic league. They are currently 5th in the league, with three wins, three draws and two losses after eight games. On the other hand, FC Porto continues its traditional dominance in the Portuguese league with four wins in four games, with nine goals scored and just one allowed. I expect FC Porto to dominate Austria Wien's offense with their world class defense, while I don't believe the Austrian team will be able to play the whole match today, without committing any defensive error that FC Porto will take advantage to pick up an easy win tonight. Therefore, I'll be taking FC Porto in here.

Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on FC Porto (-0,75) @ -139 / 1.72 on Pinnacle OR @ -142 / 1.70 on 5Dimes

Champions League Group Stage Week 1 Free Premium Play: Basel @ Chelsea

 

Basel @ Chelsea

Game Time: Wednesday, 2:45 PM EST

NOTE: No writeup for this Play

Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on Chelsea (-1,25) @ -112 / 1.89 on Pinnacle OR -115 / 1.87 on Betonline

Champions League Group Stage Week 1 Free Premium Play: Celtic @ AC Milan

 

Celtic @ AC Milan

Game Time: Wednesday, 2:45 PM EST

NOTE: No writeup for this Play

Pick: 3 units (Single Dime Play) on Under 2.5 @ -123 / 1.81 on Pinnacle OR -125 / 1.80 on Bookmaker

Soccer Champions League Premium Play 09/17: Shakhtar Donetsk @ Real Sociedad

Soccer Champions League - Shakhtar Donetsk @ Real Sociedad

***TRIPLE DIME PLAY***

***TOP PLAY***

From all the major leagues that I've been following on this early-season, the Spanish league is clearly the one that has been showing better quality over the other major leagues such as the English, Italian or German ones. Therefore, I immediately give an extra edge to Spanish leagues on European competitions right now. I saw Real Sociedad's two games against Lyon in the Champions League play-off round and they showed an impressive maturity for a team that isn't used to play on this kind of competitions. They know how to defend and their counter attacks are simply awesome! On the Spanish league, they currently have one win, two draws and one loss, but I don't give a lot of importance to this "subpar" start, as not only their loss was against Atletico Madrid (who is playing amazingly right now), as Real's two draws are in games that were followed by Champions League's games, on clear lookahead spots for them.

Real Sociedad will face today Shakhtar Donetsk, a overrated team right now, as they are very far from the level they showed last season. Shakhtar was one of the best surprises of the Champions League last season, as they pushed Chelsea into the Europa League on group stage. However, they sold their two best players on this off-season. Fernandinho went to Manchester City, while Henrikh Mkhitaryan went to Borussia Dortmund. Of course Shakhtar also spent a lot of money in new players, with almost all of them being young Brazilian players who were still playing on their country and so, they need to adapt to a new soccer, language and culture before being able to play at a decent level. 

The truth is that after nine rounds of the Ukraine league last season, Shakhtar had scored 29 goals, while this season after nine rounds, they have just 19 goals scored! They started last season with nine wins in a row, while they have already lost twice this season, with these two losses being on two of their last three games! When a team like Shakhtar, who has a much bigger budget than their local opponents, struggles to dominate, this is a really bad sign. So, we are in front of two teams with very different chemistry levels right now and also competing at a really different level. Real Sociedad will play at home and with their current level, I expect them to have little problems in taking out the struggling Shakhtar. If this game was played last season, I wouldn't have a play in here, but with Shakhtar's current level. I'm taking Real Sociedad in here in a Triple Dime Play!

Pick: 5 units (Triple Dime Play) on Real Sociedad (-0,25) @ -112 / 1.89 on 5Dimes