We are back in Group B of the CONCACAF Gold Cup on Thursday night where the second set of matches will be played out on an evening in Arizona which could be pivotal to the final standings in this section.
That is because the two losers from the opening set of games meet as do the two winners so by the end of the night we may well have one team pretty much into the knockout stage and another hanging on by a thread.
Qatar vs Honduras (00.45 – Viaplay Sports 1)
The opening match of the night on Thursday sees the two teams who lost their first match meeting in what is effectively a do or die clash when the invited nation Qatar go up against a Honduras side who will be hoping to turn their fortunes around.
This match is probably more important for Qatar because their close their group campaign out against Mexico who are the standout side in the group whereas Honduras have at least got that challenge out of the way. That might mean that Honduras would settle for a draw here and then have a crack at Haiti to potentially make it into the next stage. I was actually impressed with Honduras against Mexico despite the heavy nature of their defeat. They pressed high and created some good openings as a result, some of which were not capitalised on and a couple of others which forced decent saves. If they play to the same level offensively here I think they’ll have some joy in this match. Qatar went ahead against Haiti but they looked all over the shop at the back and it wasn’t like they created oceans of good opportunities so against a much less demanding attack I would imagine Honduras will cope much better defensively. Given that we can get Honduras at acceptable odds on a draw no bet line I think that is the way to approach this one.
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Haiti vs Mexico (03.00 – Viaplay Sports 1)
The second match of the double header on Thursday evening sees the two highest ranked teams in the group going at it when Haiti take on Mexico in a clash which pits the two winners from the opening set of games against each other.
Haiti needed a late goal to beat Qatar in their opening match but I thought they were decent value for that victory and I see no reason why they won’t qualify from this group but I would be surprised if they open up Mexico as easily as they did the team from the Asia region. Mexico are the one top nation in this competition who have named their strongest squad or something akin to it so they are going to be tough to stop and a limited looking Qatar side found it easy to get into the Haiti box at times so Mexico are certainly going to do it. That is all reflected in the odds though and while I would expect a pretty comfortable Mexico win here I saw enough from Haiti to see that they could have a dangerous spell or two which might scupper a handicap so I’m happy to leave this one alone and see if Mexico are as good as they looked against Honduras or just caught the central Americans cold.
Tips
Back Honduras (0AH) to beat Qatar for a 3/10 stake at 1.80 with Bet365
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