Almere City FC vs AZ Reserves Predictions

After six consecutive defeats and nine league games without a win, Almere City delivered a skin saver for their boss Michele Santoni last week. City upset the odds to beat in form Roda JC 1-2 at Parkstad Limburg Stadion, and Schappenkoppen will now look to follow up this Friday against lowly Jong AZ, to get themselves back into contention for the Play-offs.

City’s tremendous success in Kerkrade last Friday did little for their league position with the teams around them also picking up positive results, but the win stopped an almighty rot which had seen Almere drop from the top six into the bottom third in a matter of weeks.

Boss Michele Santoni had to have been close to the exit door prior to that result, but the Italian can now breathe again as he looks to continue steering his team back in the right direction.

The overall picture still looks pretty woeful for City who are 14^th in the table and two points adrift of the Play-offs heading into this Friday’s encounter with Jong AZ, but they have a good chance to post successive wins here for the first time since early November against their inferior opponents.

Jong are currently leading the battle of the bottom four after a decent 2-1 victory against Cambuur in Alkmaar last Monday, and that result made it two wins in four league outings for Michel Vonk’s men following a 1-3 triumph at fellow strugglers Jong Utrecht on match day 21.

Nonetheless, that is Jong’s only success on the road to date this term from 11 starts, and they’ve lost four of their last six away. All of those defeats have been by at least two goals, and they shipped six a fortnight ago against Roda JC – the team that Almere managed to overcome against all expectation last week.

City have won two of the three previous meetings between the sides including a 2-3 victory at AFAS Stadio on the opening night of the season, and we feel they can rediscover some form now after their huge confidence boost a few days ago.

The hosts are too short at around 4/6 to warrant an interest in the match betting alone though, as their one win in ten is an obvious turn off for getting involved at odds-on.

But we think backing the hosts to triumph with both teams to score looks potentially rewarding, based on the fact that Jong have scored in 19 of their 23 league games this term and City have only kept two clean sheets in their 23 matches.

This wager would obviously have landed in the reverse clash back in August which featured goals aplenty, and we forecast the same again here with 4-2 our correct score poke at a massive price.