Fluminense vs America MG Predictions

Sunday’s crunch Brazilian Serie A action sees Fluminense doing battle with America Mineiro. There’s a huge amount on the line as both sides seek to avoid falling into Serie B.

For most of the season, Fluminense looked certain to finish in a comfortable mid-table position but performances have been gradually worsening since star striker Pedro was ruled out for the rest of the year and Tricolor now find themselves in a fully blown crisis. A point in Sunday’s game would be enough to keep Flu up but defeat would leave them depending on other results and in their current shape; defeat certainly looks highly likely.

Indeed, the hosts are currently enduring one of the worst runs in their entire history, having not won any of their last 8 games, losing 6 times and even more concerning, not scoring a single goal in the process. Following a limp 4-0 aggregate Copa Sudamericana semi-final exit to Atletico PR in midweek, tension really flared in the stands with fans clashing with police and protests against the board ensuing, whilst manager Marcelo Oliveira has also been sacked, leaving Fabio Moreno in temporary charge this weekend.

Meanwhile, the picture couldn’t be any clearer for America Mineiro; win and they’ll stay in the division, fail to do so and they’ll almost certainly go down. Coming into the campaign as a newly promoted side that also suffered relegation in the 2016 Serie A season, Coelho were expected to struggle and have done exactly that but at least travel to Rio with their fate still in their own hands.

America may have one of the weakest squads in the division and have struggled throughout the campaign but they’ve shown they’re up for the fight in recent weeks, seeing off both Santos and Bahai either side of a defeat at champions Palmeiras, and they’ll be desperately hoping they can come up with one more set of 3 points here.

Ultimately, this a huge game for both teams and with the stakes so high, a tight game is likely to develop. Nonetheless, Fluminense have been so poor in recent weeks that you really do fear for them and you sense that they may need some help from other teams to maintain their top flight status, rather than securing it themselves.

Given they’re currently inside the drop zone, one can hardly claim America are a powerhouse either but they’ve at least picked up some good results in their last few outings and we actually see good value in backing them to when this match, given the desperate state that Fluminense are in and the big price on offer for an away win.

It’ll by no means be an easy task for the visitors, who are stronger on home soil than away, but they appear a highly motivated outfit desperate to avoid relegation and we think they could well take full advantage of their opponent’s fragile state via a 1-0 margin of victory.