UEFA Champions League -- Match Time:8/21/2013 02:45 Wednesday

Pacos de Ferreira  V  Zenit St. Petersburg Head to Head | Statistics| Odds

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P. FERREIRA – ZENIT ST PETERSBURG: PREDICTIONS

European Champions League qualifiers and a huge game in Portugal, its Pacos Ferriera v Zenit St Petersburg.

Pacos Ferriera had a fantastic season in last year’s Primeira Liga finishing an unprecedented 3rd in the table and making their 1st incursion into the Champions League. They have spent 9 seasons in the top flight in Portugal and are usually to be found in midtable. The side will be coached this year by Portuguese legend Costina after Paulo Fonseca was head hunted by Porto. Pacos have very limited European experience with only 6 ties played. They have 1 win, 2 draws and 3 defeats, they have only passed one tie so far and that was against Chisnau of Moldovia.  They opened up their league account with a disappointing 2-0 home loss to Braga.

Zenit St Petersburg are the biggest sides in Russian football at the moment thanks to the investment of energy giant Gazprom.  Coached by Luciano Spalletti and packed with stars foreign and domestic Zenit have the quality to do extremely well in this tournament. Now that the major Russian stumbling block of the season start has been moved into line with the rest of Europe we should see some major advancement from the Russian sides. Zenit have opened up very well in Russia with 3 wins, 1 draw and 1 defeat. In Champions League they dismantled Nordsjaelland of Denmark, winning both legs and advancing 6-0 on aggregate.

P. FERREIRA – ZENIT ST PETERSBURG: BETTING TIPS

A very difficult opening tie in Champions League for Pacos de Ferreira, the game will be played at Porto’s ground too as their own ground isn’t big enough for the ECL. For me its down to Zenit how this game goes down. Zenit have the tools to win this tie no problem but will the be happy to contain as they did in Denmark? I think Zenit will simply be too good for the Portuguese, I don’t see many goals here either. A low scoring Zenit win looks on the cards.

Prediction: Zenit St Petersburg Win

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