UEFA Champions League: Manchester City vs. Atletico Madrid Preview, Odds, Prediction

The battle between Manchester City and Atletico Madrid will be a delight for all the football fans. The English and the Spanish national champions meet on Tuesday night in the opening clash of their quarterfinals. Man City is a heavy favorite, but we simply can’t underestimate the guests from Madrid, who are one of the most experienced teams when it comes to playing in the knockout stages of the European competitions. Both sides are in solid shape with positive results in recent times, and that guarantees a good show at Etihad.

Preview

Manchester City (-330) has only one defeat in the latest 21 games across all competitions. They didn’t lose in the past seven, winning on five occasions and recording two draws. During this stretch, City kept five clean sheets.

Their defense is in great shape, and it seems that Guardiola tightened up the situation in this area at the best possible moment of the campaign. Despite what many think, the defense is the biggest weapon of the English champs.

Man City failed to win two of the past three events at home. After losing to Tottenham, they beat Man United, 4-1 and played without goals with Sporting. So we expect to see them pretty sharp on Tuesday night.

Atletico Madrid (+1100) won the latest six games in a row, and seven of the past eight, with the note that they had one draw in the meantime. Diego Simeone’s unit is playing the best football of the season, and they began doing that at the perfect moment.

Atletico posted four clean sheets during this stretch, three of those on the road. Why? Well simply, they are defending well, while on the other side, Joao Felix makes the difference and executes or creates chances for his teammates.

The Mattress Makers have four wins in a row away from home, and as we said already, they look very confident. One of them was at Old Trafford when they eliminated United, 0-1.

Latest News

Ruben Dias is injured, while Benjamin Mendy has to sit out due to a suspension.

Yannick Carrasco won’t play for the guests due to a red-card suspension, while Gimenez and Herrera suffered injuries and have to recover.

Head to Head Games

City and Atletico Madrid didn’t meet before. We’ve tried to find out did they at least played in some unofficial games, but there were no data on that.

Prediction

The stakes here are high, and we expect to see both Guardiola and Simeone very careful when it comes to setting the tactics for tonight’s event. They are aware that this is only the first half of the matchup. Atletico usually posts solid results against English teams, which is one more reason for City’s manager to be cautious. After all this written, the logical solution is to bet on under 2.5 goals. We are sure that the guests are coming to defend 0-0, even if they concede one goal, that won’t be too big of a problem for them. The odds on that are -110, which is a good offer and we simply have to take it.

Pick: Under 2.5 goals -110