International Football Betting: Spain v Turkey

Internationals / Tobias Gourlay / 26 March 2009 / Leave a Comment

Betting.Betfair's resident Spanish football authority turns his attention to the best team in the world's encounter with Turkey this weekend. Best Bet: Over 2.5 Goals @ [1.90]

Spain, champions of Euro 2008, are the best national team in the world, according to Fifa's rankings, and favourites to win the World Cup in South Africa next year. Turkey, surprise semi-finalists at Euro 2008, are ranked 11th. It is only right, then, that the Spanish start as odds-on favourites [1.43] to win at the Santiago Bernabéu in Madrid on Saturday night.

Spain have won 13 of their last 14 competitive games. They don't even let up in friendlies; against all opposition, they are on a 29-match unbeaten run that includes 27 wins.

Unfortunately, Vicente Del Bosque must do without two rather important players. Andrés Iniesta, the ingenious pass-master who started every game at Euro 2008, is injured. It is not yet clear whether the new-ish coach will play with wingers - Albert Riera, Santi Cazorla and David Silva are in the squad - or with Xavi, Marcos Senna and Xabi Alonso in a sturdier midfield unit.

Del Bosque will also be without the formidable presence of Carles Puyol in central defence. This means two of Juanito, Raúl Albiol and Gerard Piqué will start. None of them have Puyol's leadership qualities, although Juanito is Real Betis's club captain, so it will be incumbent upon the full-backs, Sergio Ramos and Joan Capdevila, to police their own forward runs.

Puyol's absence is noticed by Barcelona, and here it might well be noticed by Ramos, who sometimes relies on Fabio Cannavaro to tell him what to do for Real Madrid. It remains, however, that Spain have a superb defensive record in recent home games. Since losing a friendly to Romania at the end of 2006, they have kept clean sheets in 11/13 matches, and not conceded at all in six competitive games. The price on the Spanish Clean Sheet looks set to mature at somewhere around evens.

After missing Valencia's last four matches, David Villa has declared himself fit and will likely resume the partnership with Fernando Torres that so devastated Europe's best defences last summer.

Turkey will be closer to full strength, although Hamit Altintop of Bayern Munich is likely to miss the game through injury. Nihat, the Villarreal striker, is fit, but perhaps has not played enough for his club recently to be as much of a threat as he might have been.

Fatih Terim has been characteristically forthright in his pre-match press conferences: 'Fear has not been in our dictionary for years. Even if we lose we will play without holding back'. But he is concerned about the poor form of Fenerbahçe and Galatasaray, clubs that have supplied 10 of his players, whom he has told: 'You've got to get your heads up... It is clear from your eyes that you haven't been sleeping'.

The Crescent Stars won 2-0 in Armenia back in September, but were held to a goalless draw in Estonia just over a month later. They scored in all six away qualifiers for Euro 2008, but none of those opponents operated at Spain's level.

A better guide might be their performances at Euro 2008, where they scored in 90 minutes against Switzerland, the Czech Republic and Germany, but not against Croatia and Portugal. That squad was finally defeated in the semi-finals by injuries and suspension as much as by Germany. If Fatih Terim can summon a similar spirit on Saturday, Arda Turan and his ilk should cause problems for Spain's makeshift defence. This column prefers Over 2.5 Goals at [1.90] to the Spanish clean sheet because it has room for both a comfortable Spanish victory -Turkey's defensive record is modest - and a Turkish goal.

Assuming the Spanish victory that recent history so strongly suggests, there are few strong patterns to the manner of their home wins, so a firmer idea about the starting XI would have been useful. Villa and Torres are capable of individual brilliance at any time, however, and together they make Spain -1.5 worthy of consideration at [2.23].

If Del Bosque's midfield selection is cautious, it is reasonable to imagine the subtler arts of Xabi Alonso and Marcos Senna not taking hold until the second half, raising the prospect of the Draw/Spain double result at [4.80]. Just remember that recommended stakes would be higher if Iniesta was playing.