Young Boys vs APOEL Predictions & Betting Tips, Match Previews

APOEL are enjoying a fantastic start to their season, despite starting it with a Cyprus Super Cup defeat and then an elimination from the Champions League qualifiers against Copenhagen in the Playoffs.

They bounced back from this disappointment when the league campaign kicked off though, and since then they have won eight games and drawn one. Their singular draw came in the 1. Division, with both of their Europa League matches ending in an APOEL victory. These wins over Astana and Olympiakos leave them top of the group after two games, and a win here would put them in an excellent position for qualification from the group.

A lot of the thanks for their league start can go to Georgios Efrem, who has netted five goals in seven matches for the league leaders. Giannis Gianniotas and Pieros Soteriou have bagged three apiece in the league as well, despite only Soteriou being an out and out striker. He is the only one of these three to have scored in the Europa League so far as well, and all four of his goals in all competitions this season have come away from home. Soteriu comes in at an impressive 7/2 to score anytime on Thursday, whilst Efrem is an even higher value 9/2. Either of these backings look profitable options for the goalscorer market.

APOEL are going to be very difficult for Young Boys to overcome, especially with the Swiss side being in such poor form in front of goal at the moment. Their last victory came in the Swiss Cup just over a month ago when they beat Bazenheid 7-1. Since then they have drawn five games on the bounce though, with four of them ending goalless.

One of these was in their trip to Astana on match-day two of the Europa League group stages, with that draw following on from a 1-0 defeat at home to Olympiakos to leave them bottom of the table after two games.

Young Boys are struggling a bit with injuries at the moment to be fair. Left winger Miralem Sulejmani and striker Alexander Gerndt are both sidelined with serious knee injuries and are significant losses to the team. This leaves Guillaume Hoarau to pick up the reins in front of goal, with him netting four times in six appearances in the league this season. All of these have come on home turf as well, so if Young Boys do anything positive in this match it will probably be thanks to him.

There is a relatively strong possibility that they won’t be able to get anything past APOEL. The visitors have kept five clean sheets in their last six games and Young Boys have failed to score in the Europa League this season. The hosts have also failed to find the net in four of their last five games and couldn’t score against Olympiakos at home last month, so backing an APOEL Clean Sheet at huge odds of 10/3 looks like a profitable bet. I’m going for a 1-0 win for the visitors at 10/1 as well.