Parana vs Palmeiras Predictions

Sunday’s Brazilian Serie A action appears a huge mismatch, with already relegated Parana playing host to near champions Palmeiras. It’s expected to be as routine a victory as they come for the visitors.

After earning a somewhat surprising promotion from Serie B last year and coming into the season with a squad looking desperately short of top flight quality, Parana were expected to struggle and that they’ve certainly done. In fact, already relegated and bottom with just 21 points from 34 games, the hosts have to go down as one of the weakest sides in recent Serie A history.

Parana simply do not have the tools to compete at this level and having lost a staggering 21 times already this campaign, fans cannot wait for the year to end. A 1-0 home defeat to Atletico Mineiro in midweek, with 9 men, has done little to raise confidence in home ranks and those taking to the pitch do so knowing they have almost no chance of securing a result.

That’s because they face a Palmeiras outfit with their eyes firmly on the Serie A prize. Verdao had struggled with inconsistency early on in the season but have been fantastic since bringing Luiz Felipe Scolari into the dugout at around the mid-way point. Scolari has overseen a run which has seen the team win 14 of their last 19 matches, and they only need a couple more points to be crowned champions.

5 points clear with just 4 games left to play, Palmeiras are in a fantastic position and it’d take a huge collapse for them to throw away such a commanding lead in such a short period of time. A dominant 3-0 home win over Fluminense in midweek has spirits high in travelling ranks and also 9 matches unbeaten on the road in league action, those travelling for Sunday’s clash will be confident in picking up the result they need.

Ultimately, in normal circumstances you’d fear for Parana, but given the fact they’re also without 4 suspended players and have various other problems, it’s hard to envisage them providing any sort of resistance to a Palmeiras outfit that has been close to unstoppable in recent months.

As such, whilst Palmeiras are rightfully huge favourites on the full time line, there are still come interesting markets to bet on, the first of which being a visiting win to nil. 18 of Parana’s 21 defeats have also seen them fail to score and as such, if Palmeiras do win as expected, it’s almost certain to be with a clean sheet intact.

Given the huge disparity in quality between the two parties, we’re also happy to have a play on the Palmeiras Half Time/Full Time line. Palmeiras have been winning 17 of their 34 matches so far this season by half time and they should be able to establish control over the match in the first 45 minutes, before going on to run out 2-0 winners.