England youngsters can't dismiss Romania
Stuart Pearce's Young Lions head into this evening's European Under-21 Championship qualification play-off first leg against Romania at Carrow Road as convincing [1.49] favourites, however that price belies their contrasting performances so far in the preliminary competition.
Whereas England only made it to this stage as one of the four best runners-up after an at times nervy victory over Lithuania in their final group game, Romania won Group A in impressive fashion, achieving the third best points average of all participants.
Their away record was strong too, with three triumphs and four clean sheets taken from five trips abroad. There was one inexplicable stumble midway through the campaign though, in which they were thrashed 5-1 by mediocre Latvia. That slip aside, they conceded just once in nine matches.
England's Under-21s can take further encouragement from both their home form - three wins in four - and defensive improvement - they've managed four shutouts in five after a leaky start, with Michael Mancienne and Chris Smalling present in all of those encounters.
In addition, Romania haven't qualified for any of the six finals staged since they last hosted in 1998, so Pearce will be confident that Daniel Sturridge and Danny Welbeck can ensure that his team travel to Botosani on Tuesday with a lead.
The best bet though, given Romania's resilience and England's increasingly solid back four, has to be under 2.5 goals at the delicious price of [2.0]. The Young Lions are [7.4] to nick it 1-0.
England Under-21s v Romania Under-21s
Kick-off: 7.30pm
Live on ESPN
Think Pearce and his youngsters are in for a nasty surprise? Romania are a huge [8.2]...
Published: 8 Oct 2010
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