A bronze medal is up for grabs in the one men’s football match to be played at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics on Friday. It probably isn’t the colour of medal that either Mexico or Japan would have wanted but it will reflect their efforts should they achieve it.
Mexico were the champions in this competition in 2012 so a win here would continue a good heritage in Olympic football while Japan are obviously the host nation and would love to come away from their home Games with a medal.
Mexico
Mexico have been one of the better sides in the competition to watch and they were so unlucky not to be playing the final. They came unstuck against a Brazil side who beat them on penalty kicks but for so much of the match Mexico were their equals. They just couldn’t quite handle the pressure when the spot kicks came around which was unfortunate. They have combined style with substance and certainly wouldn’t be fluky medal winners should they secure one.
Mexico have been free scoring throughout the competition so it was a bit of a surprise when they passed up a couple of good chances against the Brazilians. Prior to that, Mexico had found the net 14 times in their four matches in the competition so if they can get back to something approaching that sort of strike rate they should be in decent enough touch here. They will need to keep the back door shut but they managed that successfully against Brazil.
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Japan
Throughout the first group stage of the competition, Japan were going along very nicely but then you could sense the pressure was hitting them when they needed a penalty shootout to get the better of New Zealand in the quarter final. They were then a shade unlucky to fall to Spain in the semi-final in extra time but in truth Spain had plenty of chances earlier in the match to put the hosts out of their misery and didn’t take them.
That would be the big concern for Japan in this bronze medal match – that they haven’t scored since the group stage and that they have had to play an extra 30 minutes of football than their opponents here. There is something which will give Japan confidence heading into this match though. That is that they have already defeated Mexico in this tournament when they saw them off 2-1 in the group stage. A repeat of that will do them here.
Betting
I always say that third placed matches are more open affairs with goals in them. That doesn’t necessarily apply here because there is a genuine reward for winning this match so this is a competitive third placed game rather than the ones we see at a World Cup or a Copa America for example where it really is a consolation match that neither of the two teams want to be involved in so just open up and go for it.
In saying all that, I do expect there to be goals in this match because these two sides are very offense minded and I think their semi-final defeats will have reminded them that they are better trying to win matches rather than going about their business in a way not to lose. It is a little shorter than I would normally like but you can get 1.75 on over 2.5 goals in this match and given the style they play their best football with, I expect that to be a punt that lands.
Tips
Back Over 2.5 goals for a 3/10 stake at 1.75 with Betfair
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