Champions League Bet Builder Tips: Karim will rise to the top

Benzema remains great value

Manchester City 1.51/2 v Real Madrid 7.413/2; The Draw 5.04/1
Tuesday 26 April, 20:00
Live on BT Sport 2

The Champions League semi-final stage kicks off with a match between European football royalty and a Manchester City team trying to win the tournament for the first time.

City are last season's beaten finalists. Though they have become the dominant team in English football during the Pep Guardiola-era, they have yet to make the breakthrough and win the Champions League, while watching their domestic rivals Liverpool and Chelsea both lift the trophy.

From a personal perspective, Guardiola must be desperate to get his hands back on a trophy, that he has not lifted since 2011, while still at Barcelona. Since then, Real Madrid have won the Champions League four times, taking their tally to a record breaking 13 wins.

With the Copa del Rey final taking place in Spain, Real Madrid did not have to play over the weekend, so will come into this fresh. Manchester City played on Saturday, but at least had a relatively untaxing game, as they beat Watford 5-1 at home.

It was the third time in the last four home games for City, that both teams had scored. This seems a good place to begin our Bet Builder at odds of 4/5 on the Sportsbook.

In terms of a likely scorer in the match, Karim Benzema should really be leading the betting, but is instead the seventh favourite. It's somewhat baffling considering that Benzema has 39 goals from 40 games this season, which includes 12 goals from nine Champions League appearances.

There are a number of tempting options involving Benzema. The one we'll add is for the French striker to have two or more shots on target in the game at 15/8. This creates a double at odds of 4.57/2.