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League leaders Botafogo fancied against out of form visitors
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Botafogo v Internacional
Saturday 20 July
22:30 BST kick-off
Brazilian league leaders Botafogo take on an out-of-form Internacional on Saturday looking to double their lead at the top of the Serie A table.
The hosts are in flying form with four league wins on the spin while the visitors have no win in four and a run of form that cost manager Eduardo Coudet his job.
After Pablo Fernandez took interim charge for a coule of games, Roger Machado has been installed as new permanent boss, but can he get the famed 'new manager bounce' from a road trip to the league leaders?
In short, no, there'll be no new manager bounce here for Machado, with just a couple of days in the new job making the journey from Porto Alegre to Rio to face a table-topping side bang in form.
Botafogo have won four of their last five at Estadio Nilton Santos and while Internacional are unbeaten in three away games, all have come against teams below them with two of the three, Gremio and Fluminense, in the bottom three in the table.
So we'll back the hosts at 8/111.73 to get another three points.
Internacional have had at least three cards in three of their last four away league games, and they've also totalled 5+ in two of those games so when they go they usually go big.
Throw in playing away from home at the league leaders, and trying to impress a new manager, and we've got all the ingredients for a few cards.
We'll play it a touch conservative though and back the 4/91.44 on over 2.5 Internacional cards.
Botafogo spread their goals around so we're not looking for someone to find the net, bur rather some to continually get shots in on goal.
Junior Santos is that man - he leads the team in Serie A shots on target, and has had at least two in three of his last four outings - he hasn't scored but in this case that helps us as he'll kee pn shooting until he does.
He's had over twice as many shots as anyone else in the squad, so we'll back him for 2+ shots on target at 15/82.88 to complete our Bet Builder.
Back Botafogo win, over 2.5 Internacional cards & Santos 2+ shots on target @