Inter Milan v Benfica: Use Joao Mario to boost the travelers tempting price

• Visitors unbeaten in their last seven away matches in Champions League

• But Eagles have lost their last three matches in a row

• Plenty of penalties in Benfica CL matches this season

• Read on for a potential 3.62 Bet Builder

Inter Milan v Benfica
Wednesday April 19, 20:00
Live on BT Sports

Inter hot favourites to progress

It's fair to say Inter did a proper old-fashioned Italian Job on Benfica in that first leg. Less possession, less total shots, but getting the better of the only stat matters.

Even a 1-0 win would have beyond their expectations but Romelu Lukaku's late penalty has Inter firmly in the driving seat and odds of 1.081/12 look right on them to qualify.

With a struggle going on to finish Top 4 and qualify for next year's edition of the CL they'll be happy that the money is still coming in thanks to this year's campaign; a place in the semis would be even better, but they can't afford to be complacent.

Proof of their struggles in Serie A is that they followed up that excellent win in Lisbon with defeat at home to Monza. Yes, a couple of players were rested ahead of this one and they were fortunate that Top 4 rivals Milan only drew; but they need to keep their eye on both competitions.

No-one is suspended and Ediz Dzeko and Lautaro Martinez are expected to start together in attack, meaning Lukaku may have to settle for a place on the bench again.

Three losses on the spin for Benfica

Talk about a week and a half being a long time in football.

Favourites to progress against Inter in Europe and miles ahead of Porto in the league, they lost both their league matches either side of that loss to Inter and are in a right pickle.

There's still enough of a safety net (four points) to feel they're hot favourites to win the league. But it's hard to understand what happened in these last three games because it hasn't been down to absences.

The defeats to Porto and Inter can be somewhat justified, the loss to Chaves at the weekend less so.

So plenty for Roger Schmidt to think about, including whether he should keep faith with the XI he's been playing most of the season who got them into strong positions. Or whether to make a few changes. No-one is suspended for Benfica, either.

Match odds market hard to call

The match odds market looks like a bit of a minefield.

There's Inter at 2.186/5 to win a game they don't need to (even a defeat by one goal would see them through), the draw at 3.613/5 that may seem unlikely given Benfica have to go for it and the visitors at 3.6553/20.

The latter would normally be considered a good price throughout this season but maybe not so much given they're going through what is arguably their worst spell of the campaign.

The Opta stat that Benfica are unbeaten in their last six away matches in the Champions League and the theory they must surely improve on last week's performance probably makes a lay of Inter at 2.186/5 the best choice in that market.

Benfica games full of penalties

One market worth a look at is the 'penalty taken' market.

It should perhaps have come as no surprise that Benfica conceded a penalty in the first leg given that only PSG (17) have conceded more spot kicks than Benfica (13) since the start of the 2016-17 Champions League campaign. That was from Opta.

But they also get plenty of their own. In fact, they got one in both legs of the previous round against Brugge, one in each of their two group matches against Juventus, got one for them and one against them away at PSG; they also conceded one against Maccabi Haifa.

So that's now seven out of nine matches since the start of the Group Stages that there's been a spot-kick in a Benfica CL match.

Inter matches haven't had nearly as many but it's impossible to ignore a 7/4 chance (that a penalty will be taken) on something that has happened 7/9 times in Benfica games this season.

Another chance for Mario in a Bet Builder

We spoke in length last week about the goalscoring exploits of Joao Mario who has 17 league goals to go with six in nine matches in this competition, plus a decent record when it comes to assists, as well.

We also mentioned he was the chief beneficiary of Benfica getting so many penalties this season, a trend just discussed.

He let us down last week in the 'to score or assist' market where he had a relatively quiet match. But at a bigger price of 9/5 this time, he deserves a chance to redeem himself.

Mario creating or scoring a goal would go some way to the visitors avoiding defeat, something they have a decent chance of doing, whether they make it through, or not. It's 4/6 on the Eagles in the Double Chance market.

Combining the two brings the Bet Builder to odds of 3.62.