Euro 2012 Betting: Capello's England's superb on the road

England look good value for a win in Montenegro on Friday night, based on their excellent away record under Fabio Capello.

The Italian has guided them to seven wins in eight qualifiers on the road and the only failure was a 1-0 defeat in Ukraine towards the end of qualifying for the 2010 World Cup, when England had already booked their ticket to South Africa.

Other than that, England have been impressive in away qualifiers. They have scored at least two goals in each of their seven wins and their winning margin has never been less than two goals, with an overall aggregate of 21 goals to three in those seven games.

That means an average of three goals scored per game, with an average supremacy of around 2.5 goals, and England have to be considered on the Asian handicap. They are 2.1211/10 at -1.0 on the handicap.

England's opponents in their away qualifiers under Capello have been of widely varying quality, of course, but two of the more impressive wins (4-1 in Croatia and 3-1 in Switzerland) were against teams currently in the top 20 on the Fifa rankings.

Montenegro are just below that level, having improved significantly during the Euro 2012 qualifying campaign (rising from 89th to 26th on the Fifa rankings). But they look limited, with an over-reliance on keeping a clean sheet, as they did in the goalless draw at Wembley 12 months ago.

Montenegro have scored nil or one in all six qualifiers and their three wins have been 1-0. Given their need for a win and England's scoring record on the road, it looks difficult for Montenegro to shut out Capello's team again.

The biggest doubt is whether England - who have always won on the road for Capello when they've needed to - will go for the win or settle for the point that will put them through to the finals. But this is a different scenario to the Ukraine match, because it is a fully competitive rubber, and on the stats England have a lot going for them.

The Fifa rankings also indicate that Switzerland should be even bigger favourites than they are for the visit to the Liberty stadium on Friday night.

Wales beat Montenegro 2-1 in their last home match, which was an indication that they are making progress under Gary Speed's management, but there is a danger that the odds may overestimate Wales.

Familiarity may be a factor here, with most punters knowing more about the Welsh players than the Swiss. But, as highly rated as Gareth Bale, Craig Bellamy and Aaron Ramsey are, Wales's overall international form is poor.

Their home record, in fact, is black and white, with no draw in their last 15. In that period they have had seven wins and eight defeats, but they have lost eight out of 12 against teams above their current Uefa ranking of 90 and five out of seven against teams currently ranked in the top 50.

Switzerland are ranked 18th and their difficulties in the group all came at the start, when they lost 3-1 at home to England and 1-0 in Montenegro. After that they beat Wales 4-1 at home and later were arguably unlucky in a 2-2 at Wembley against England, which is better form than Wales can show.

Although Wales's home win over Montenegro reads much better than their previous form, making them arguably underrated by their Fifa ranking, Switzerland still look the bet on the stats.

Recommendations

England win at 1.738/11
Switzerland win at 1.9210/11