NATIONS LEAGUE SEMI-FINALS: The Ultra previews NETHERLANDS v CROATIA on Wednesday with a recommended BETDAQ bet.
NETHERLANDS V CROATIA
7.45pm Only days after the Champions League Final, football returns with the Nations League Semi-Finals! This is the start of an International break on BETDAQ BETTING EXCHANGE with European Qualifiers coming up after the Nations League Semi-Finals too. We have two cracking Semi-Finals across Wednesday and Thursday – no doubt that the glamour tie is Spain v Italy on Thursday, but we start the action with an intriguing affair as Netherlands take on Croatia Wednesday night.
It’s been such a long gap between when the Group stages finished and these games – the sides played their final Group stages in September 2022! I know they have to fit the Finals into an International break in a crammed schedule, but it does feel too long in my opinion. Nevertheless, Netherlands topped Group A4 and Croatia topped Group 1A. Croatia topping their Group was a surprise, but France were exceptionally below form in that Group – in hindsight it was obvious they were fully focused on the World Cup and weren’t too bothered about the Nations League. Netherlands were very impressive, topping their Group unbeaten which included Belgium and Poland.
Netherlands will come into this game expected to win. They are clear favourites, but they aren’t quite odds on. They are trading 2.12 at the time of writing with Croatia 3.95 and the draw is 3.4. Croatia always tend to be underdogs, and generally over-perform in the big tournaments. They had a better run than Netherlands at the World Cup, beating tournament favourites Brazil on penalties in the Quarter-Finals which was a big shock, then exiting at the Semi-Final stage to eventual winners Argentina. Netherlands exited to Argentina as well, at the Quarter-Final stage.
The Netherlands played well reasonably against Argentina, only getting beaten on penalties but they were poor in the lead up to that game. They were very unimpressive going forward in the Group stage with xG figures of only 1.31, 0.11 and 1.72 (v Qatar). They then beat the USA, but conceded a higher xG figure than they created and in general they just didn’t look as good as they have looked in qualifying or the Nations League. Sometimes being strong at the back in better in the major tournaments, but they lost their spark going forward in order to be solid at the back.
They can easily perform better than those games, and although winning the Nations League would be nice there’s definitely less pressure. Croatia were pretty poor at the World Cup if you look at their under-lining numbers, and they were lucky to get so far. How they got a 0-0 draw against Belgium to quality is anyone’s guess – they conceded an xG figure of 3.22! They went to penalties against Japan and Brazil while conceding a higher xG figure than they created, and then got thrashed against Argentina. They did well to win the Third Place Playoff, but again they conceded a higher xG figure than they created.
It’s hard to rave about this Croatia side on paper. They do look pretty average, however they do grind out a lot of results and you have to give them huge credit for that. In a big game against an attacking Netherlands side it’s hard to see them doing anything other than sitting back here, and Under 2.5 goals looks nice value at 1.69. Netherlands didn’t create enough at the World Cup to justify backing them at 2.12 here in my opinion, and I much prefer the goals bet.
The Ultra Says:
Three points win Under 2.5 goals at 1.69 with BETDAQ BETTING EXCHANGE.
You can view all markets here -> https://betdaq.biz/NetCro
