Pandurii Tg Jiu vs Astra Ploiesti
Football: Romanian Liga 1
Venue: "Tudor Vladimirescu", Tg Jiu
Monday 26th September - Kickoff time: 19:00 GMT+2

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Pandurii (5th W-4 D-2 L-1)

Pandurii is coming after their first victory on the road and what a success it was, against the most important Romanian club, Steaua Bucuresti. However, the victory came with a high price, midfielder Cosmin Bacila suffering a cannon bone fracture that will keep him away for at least 6 months.

The victory against Steaua had a positive impact regarding their table position as well, Pandurii were second at the beginning of this stage and could return to that position if they manage to collect all three points today.

Pandurii had an easy game in the Romanian cup round of 32 played on Wednesday, qualifying to the next round after a 5-0 victory against a third league team.

Pandurii is the only team that has won every game played at home and they had some tough opponents like Brasov or CFR Cluj.

Pandurii’s previous home results:

12.09.2011 Liga 1 Etapa 6 Pandurii Tg. Jiu 5 - 1 Dacia Mioveni
22.08.2011 Liga 1 Etapa 4 Pandurii Tg. Jiu 2 - 0 CFR Cluj
01.08.2011 Liga 1 Etapa 2 Pandurii Tg. Jiu 2 - 1 FC Brasov

Astra Ploiesti (8th W-3 D-2 L-2)

Astra was not so lucky at the draws having to play against CFR Cluj in the Romanian Cup, a team that won the cup two times in the last 4 years, but CFR decided to use their second squad, considering that their upcoming league game against Rapid was more important and Astra took advantage of this fact eliminating them after a 1-0 win.

Astra Ploiesti started the championship with Tibor Selymes as their head coach, but two consecutive defeats determined the owner to sack him, assigning ex-Rapid coach, Marius Sumudica to be his successor. Since then, Astra haven’t lost any games, which means that they are unbeaten in their last 6 games including the cup.

Their only away win this season was obtained against newly-promoted CS Mioveni (0-1), but Astra is not a team that can win too many when playing away from home, they only managed to win three times in 17 games last season.

Astra Ploiesti’s away results:

09.09.2011 Liga 1 Etapa 6 FCM Târgu-Mureş 2 - 2 Astra Ploiesti
12.08.2011 Liga 1 Etapa 3 Dacia Mioveni 0 - 1 Astra Ploiesti
24.07.2011 Liga 1 Etapa 1 CFR Cluj 2 - 0 Astra Ploiesti

The betting verdict

We have too teams in excellent form that are likely to finish in the top half of the table at the end of the season. Astra was always a defensive team, there are not many goals scored in their games, but Pandurii has some quality players in front like Vranjes or Stromajer that could break even a tight defense like this.

Astra is a team like Stoke City in England, they are tough to beat when playing at home even by the best teams from the league, but they are not doing so well when playing on the road. Pandurii has an average of three goals per match at home, so they do have the firepower to get a winner, I think this is the kind of game in which the first team that scores is likely to take away all points or a draw in worst case.

The Pick :

Pandurii Tg Jiu 1-0 Astra Ploiesti

FIXED ODDS BETTING :

Take Pandurii to win at 2.30 Interwetten
Confidence: 8/10