FC Brasov v Unirea Urziceni
Football: Romanian Liga 1
Venue: "Tineretului" stadium, Brasov
Monday 23th August – Kickoff time: 20:00 GMT+2

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FC Brasov

Brasov got a nice start this season, beating two newly promoted teams in the first two stages, FCM Targu Mures (1-0) and "U" Cluj (3-1).

They managed to stay unbeaten until the 4th round, when they came across SC Vaslui who caused them the first defeat, 2-1. Prior to that they frustrated Steaua, being the only team so far that remained unbeaten after a match against them.

Brasov is a team that usually finishes between places 7-12, they do have the quality to defeat any team from the league when they are in a good day, but not constant enough to win a seat that could offer them a European campaign. It is like Blackburn Rovers of the Romanian league, they rarely relegate but don’t have the power to fight for a top position.

Brasov is close to sign Armenian brothers, Artiom and Arman Karamyan, who played for Steaua in the previous season. They need to buy a few players until the transfer season ends because three of their most important players joined Rapid Bucuresti this summer so theoretically they are weakened comparing to the previous season.

Unirea Urziceni

Unirea scored first in the first leg against Hajduk Split in the Europa League play-offs and were looking to cause a huge disappointment to punters who had their money on Hajduk – and there were many of them, odds dropped from 1.7 to 1.5 for a home win. The result didn’t remained untouched for a long time, Hajduk equalized in the first half, then humiliated Unirea on the second, winning 4-1.

Meanwhile, despite declaring that he will stay until the end of the second leg against Hajduk, Ronny Levi decided to sign his resignation after the game, so Unirea are currently without a coach and president. There’s an exile from the squad, goalkeeper Arlauskis joined Rubin Kazan for a 1m euro deal, while Galamaz, Marinescu and Ricardo moved to Astra Ploiesti. Two of their best players, striker Bilasco and Brandan are very close of leaving the team, currently negotiating with several clubs.

The situation is dramatic at Urziceni, everyone is talking about them not finishing the championship because of the severe financial problems, but then they would have to pay back the money received for television rights so we’ll probably see them until the end of the season struggling in the second part of the table. It is the beginning of the end for a team that was artificially created but managed to surprise everyone from Romania with their superb performances showing than performance can be made despite not having supporters or other kind of support.

Head to head

02.05.2010 Liga 1 Etapa 30 Unirea Urziceni 1 - 0 FC Brasov
07.11.2009 Liga 1 Etapa 13 FC Brasov 0 - 0 Unirea Urziceni
28.02.2009 Liga 1 Etapa 18 Unirea Urziceni 0 - 0 FC Brasov
26.07.2008 Liga 1 Etapa 1 FC Brasov 1 - 0 Unirea Urziceni

The Betting Verdict :

The odds for a home win are dropping as fast as Unirea's decline, so I would recommend taking it until it's above evens, otherwise there would not be value in it. For example Pinnacle gave an opening odd of 2.60 which fell to 2.23 so far.

Unirea's problems are beyond retrieval, so Brasov who is a decent team should take advantage of this situation and register their third success this season.

Unirea, with this current squad can play at the same level as Brasov, but the difference will be made by motivation. Urziceni's players do not know where they'll play a few months later, so this situation of uncertainty affects their performance. Let's not mention that they have not been payed for more than two months.

The Pick :

FC Brasov 1-0 Unirea Urziceni

FIXED ODDS BETTING :

FC Brasov to win at 2.375 Eurobet
Confidence: 7/10