Thursday Football Tips: Corners and goals on the Celtic menu

AZ Alkmaar v Celtic
Thursday 26 August, 19:15 kick-off
Live on Premier Sports 1

West Brom threw us a curve ball on Wednesday as the Baggies played the reserves and got battered by Arsenal, but there's nothing but full-strength sides expected here as AZ Alkmaar and Celtic battle for Europa League qualification.

A nice 2-0 win in Glasgow puts Celtic in pole position and they'll really fancy their chances having also anjoyed a fine 6-0 thumping of St Mirren at the weekend.

AZ carried enough threat in the first leg though to suggest they'll provide some problems, and they've had a week off with their Eredivisie game postponed to help them prepare for this tie.

Alkmaar finished last season by scoring in each of their last seven home games and totalling 21 goals in the process - they'll need to maintain that average of three goals a game as you suspect Celtic will be able to bag at least one.

The hosts will hope that Celtic are stuck in that no man's land of not knowing whether to stick or twist on a 2-0 lead and end up blowing it - just as they did against Utrecht in a Europa League play-off 11 years ago when they went out after winning the first leg 2-0.

An omen? Possibly, and you really wouldn't rule it out totally, but you'd have to go with Celtic to make it through.

The Bhoys are a short price to get through but a very backable 3.8514/5 on the exchange just to win the game in 90 minutes, something which is well achievable especially if they score first.

It's the Bet Builder markets on the Sportsbook that we're looking at for this game though, with a lively encounter expected and both teams not scared of getting it out wide, the case for corners is strong.

There was a whopping 16 corners in the first leg, eight each, and with the line set at 10.5 for ths game I'll be taking the 23/20 that there are 11 or more corner kicks.

That in itself is worth a bet, but that's being thrown in with both teams to score - given Celtic's recent glut of goals and AZ's recent home record that's more than likely and helps boost our return nicely.