Deportivo La Guaira vs Atletico Nacional Medellin Predictions

Wednesday’s Copa Libertadores second round, first leg clash sees Venezuelans Deportivo La Guaira doing battle with Colombians Atletico Nacional. The visitors will be looking to stamp their mark on a tie they’re expected to win easily.

Deportivo La Guaira’s first ever Copa Libertadores tie certainly wasn’t free of drama, as they knocked Peruvians Real Garcilaso out of the first round on away games after a 3-3 aggregate draw. In truth, Los Naranjas were very fortunate to advance and were gifted their defining goal last week via some shocking opposition defending, but they’ll need more than good fortune to advance from this tie.

Only founded in 2008, the hosts are not a team of any real pedigree and coming from a Venezuelan game that ranks as the weakest on the continent, they’ve done well to even reach this point. Nonetheless, having lost 4 of their last 5 matches, Deportivo do not have great momentum behind them and are undoubtedly massive underdogs in this tie.

Meanwhile, 2016 Libertadores winners Atletico Nacional come into the tie with the expectation of winning it comfortably but will have to approach it in a professional manner to avoid any slip-ups. Having also made it to the last 16 of the competition last season, El Verde are an outfit of considerable pedigree on the Libertadores scene and reaching the group stage is a minimum expectation as far as fans are concerned.

Having taken 7 points from their opening 3 league matches, winning the last two, Atletico Nacional arrive in confident mood for Wednesday’s match. Whilst Libertadores away days typically involve travelling huge distances, the visitors are only a 2 hour flight away from Caracas and as such, the visitors won’t arrive too fatigued and all focus can be on the match itself.

Ultimately, over two legs, Deportivo La Guaira have very little chance of eliminating a team as powerful as Atletico Nacional and taking the match as a standalone fixture, the host’s prospects don’t really look any brighter. Man for man, Atletico are by far the stronger of the two and that’s expected to translate onto the pitch over the forthcoming 180 minutes.

As such, backing an away win looks the way to play as far as the betting goes and is something we’re more than happy to do. Deportivo are struggling to secure positive results against far weaker opponents than the side they face here and with the visitors having won their last two games 1-0, that’s a scoreline we can see this fixture finishing with.