Rangers and Aberdeen will reach cup final
Interesting statistic time - despite the Old Firm's utter dominance of Scottish football, it's surprisingly rare for them to collide in domestic cup finals. Despite winning the League Cup in 14 of the last 18 years, they've only faced one another in two of the last 19 deciders. That suggests that one of them will lose in the semi-finals this weekend - but which one? Here are our predictions...
Aberdeen v Celtic (Saturday, 3pm)
The Dons are absolutely flying under new manager Craig Brown, moving ten points clear of bottom Hamilton, however they've conceded ten without scoring in their two meetings with Celtic so far this season. There's also a tendency for a team that go on a cup run with a struggling manager to make a swift exit after changing bosses - see Ipswich in the Carling Cup - and it was Mark McGhee who took Aberdeen this far. They are performing so well right now though and lost to the Bhoys by just one goal at Parkhead last week, so there's definitely appeal in backing them at [7.2].
Rangers v Motherwell (Sunday, 3pm, BBC1 Scotland)
Brown is no stranger to success in the cup anyway, having guided Motherwell this far before leaving to be replaced by Stuart McCall. The former Bradford boss has struggled to have an immediate positive impact and the Steelmen have won only one of their last ten matches against SPL sides. Rangers have enjoyed 4-1 victories in each of their clashes with them so far this season and are in decent form having triumphed without leaking a goal in four of their five games since losing to Celtic. Therefore, our fancy is for the holders to win to nil at the tempting price of [2.4].
Disagree with our predictions and punts? Tell us yours below...
Published: 27 Jan 2011
ftsfa (January 27, 2011 5:05 PM) said:
Dung
joey (January 27, 2011 5:34 PM) said:
what aload of balls the way celtic played last night were fantastic so we will go threw to the final and win and win the leauge and scottish cup hail hail and i cn see rangers getting beat by motherwell