International Friendly Bets–England v Czech Republic
England play the Czech Republic tonight in a friendly match in preparation for their upcoming World Cup qualifier against Andorra at the start of next month.
Fabio Capello ended a lot of speculation when he named John Terry as his captain this week with Rio Ferdinand being named as vice-captain. This isn’t a decision that’s pleased everyone, but Terry is definitely a leader on the field and in our opinion is the best man to lead England into their World Cup campaign.
The Czech Republic look to be rebuilding after a poor showing at EURO 2008, but they won’t be an easy side to beat and will give England a stern test. If England want to win tonight then they will have to find a way past Chelsea goalkeeper Petr Cech and that will be no easy task. The Czech Republic do look to have an inexperienced strike partnership for tonight’s match however and combined with a poor away record they can’t really be backed with a great deal of confidence to get a win 4/1 (Partybets) in our opinion.
That doesn’t mean however that this is going to be a formality for England tonight. Although the have won 3 out of their last 4 friendly matches England don’t have a great record against teams ranked higher than them in the World rankings. They haven’t managed to beat a team ranked higher than themselves in 8 games against superior opposition. With England ranked 14th and the Czech Republic currently ranked 8th we definitely won’t be putting our mortgage on them to win tonight, especially at 4/6 (Skybet).
We’d approach tonight’s game with some caution if you are having a bet and with both teams looking strong defensively a low scoring match looks likely. The under 2.5 goals 8/13 (Paddypower) looks a bet to be on and the draw at 9/2 (Bet365) has definitely got to be considered.
With England having home advantage we’re going to tip an England win, but think it will be a close match. We’re going for a 1-0 win to England 5/1 (Coral) and we think both Frank Lampard 8/1 (Skybet.com) and John Terry 25/1 (Ladbrokes) could be worth a bet to get the goal.