Red Bull Salzburg vs Admira Predictions

It’s all been rather easy for reigning champions Salzburg, who after four matches of the new Austrian Bundesliga campaign, have maximum points. In contrast, Admira currently sit bottom of the table after gaining just a single point from four games. The strugglers could be in for a very tough afternoon at Red Bull Arena.

Home or away, it doesn’t really seem to matter to Salzburg, who’ve won two out of two at home and two out of two on the road. They’ve scored a whopping 17 goals and have conceded just three. Curiously, those three have all come at Red Bull Arena.

On their own patch, in an attacking sense, Salzburg have been very impressive. They’ve been creative, posting expected goals for figures of 3.13 and 2.95, while they’ve been very effective, scoring nine goals. The way in which the league leaders made light work of cutting through both Mattersburg and Wolfsberger’s rear-guards was impressive.

However, for all their attacking power, Salzburg haven’t covered themselves in defensive glory at home. In truth, they haven’t had to, though it’s still worth noting that they’ve looked shaky at the back. Sunday’s hosts conceded against Mattersburg, while they shipped twice against Wolfsberger. Not only did they concede in those two games, but they surrendered expected goals figures of 1.29 and 2.55, which suggests that teams have found it relatively easy to create against the league leaders.

Admira have struggled, make no mistake about that, though their two away efforts were reasonable in part. Away at Hartberg, for all they couldn’t defend, conceding four goals, they offered a threat going forward, as they created 1.96 expected goals for and duly got on the score-sheet. Last time out, Admira registered their first point of the campaign by drawing away against Austria Vienna. On that occasion, as they scored and created 1.27 expected goals for, they looked a threat on the break, which bodes well ahead of this match.

In the betting, ‘Over 2.5 Goals & Both Teams to Score’ makes plenty of appeal. Salzburg have shown more than enough in the final third to suggest that they can do some serious damage on Sunday, though their defensive efforts haven’t been great. Averages of 1.5 goals and 1.92 expected goals against at home are poor. Add in the fact that Admira have done their best attacking work when playing on the break away from home, scoring in two out of two travelling matches, posting a more than reasonable average of 1.62 expected goals for, and we can conclude that a high-scoring game, where both teams notch, is more likely than the current prices suggest.