Champions League: AC Milan lock horns with Czech Republic title holders Viktoria Plzen
AC Milan meet Czech Republic title holders Viktoria Plzen for the first time in a competitive match at the San Siro on Wednesday night and, having earned a highly creditable draw away to Barcelona in their opening Champions League fixture, the Rossonerri can put themselves in a strong position to qualify from the group at least as runners-up by bagging three points.
The Italian champions failed to follow-up their heroics in the Camp Nou back in domestic action five days later when outpointed by Napoli, and were then held to a draw by Udinese. However, they quickly bounced back when seeing off Cesena at the weekend, and the visitors’ coach Pavel Urba won’t take heart from the fact that Milan have won all four of their previous home games against Czech opposition in this tournament.
What Urba will be heartened by in terms of statistics is that the Diavolo have only won two of their 14 most recent matches in the Champions League, but while Massimiliano Allegri has plenty of key players on the easy list at present – Robinho, Alexandre Pato, Kevin-Prince Boateng and Mathieu Flamini are all injured, and Zlatan Ibrahimovic is far from certain to take part– it’s hard to envisage AC slipping up in this game.
With Emanuelson and Aquilani likely to be sitting just off him, Antonio Cassano, who looks set to start up front in a lone striker role, will receive plenty of ammunition, and rates a good bet at 4.75 with bet365 in the first goalscorer market.