Athletic Bilbao vs Rapid Vienna Predictions & Betting Tips, Match Previews

Athletic are chasing a 4th straight win in all competitions here after a good week or so in La Liga. Victories over Valencia, Granada and Sevilla have fired them up to 5th place and they have won 4 in a row in the league now, having lost their opening two games. They’ve conceded in all of those 3 recent wins though and put in a pretty inept showing at Sassuolo in their opening Europa League match. A 3-0 defeat in Italy has left them with work to do in this group and Ernesto Valverde will know that nothing short of maximum points will be good enough here.

Rapid Vienna by contrast got off to the perfect start by winning their group opener against Genk. 3 Rapid goals in the space of just 9 Second Half minutes turned the game on its head, although they did end up having to hang on for a 3-2 victory. Defensively Rapid aren’t a great side, certainly at European level and they have dire memories of their last meetings with a side from La Liga when they were thrashed 10-0 on aggregate by Gary Neville’s Valencia last season. They did win 5 of their 6 group games last term though which was something of a surprise. Rapid have lost just 1 of their last 12 games but are already 6 points off Sturm Graz, who currently top the Austrian Bundesliga.

This game has the potential to produce lots of goals. Athletic may have little choice but to name a strong side here given that opening day defeat and with the likes of Raul Garcia and Aduriz in decent form, they should cause Rapid plenty of problems. They are leaking goals though and have kept just 1 clean sheet so far this season, so a fairly attacking Rapid side are capable of getting on the score-sheet too and backing Over 2.5 Goals at 3/4 looks to offer value.