March 19th League Cup play-offs

League Cup goes on - and so does the Finnish Cup!

Hi lads!

Edit: Heavy snowing, Honka-Jaro might be transferred indoors and it would increase Honka´s winning chances even more.No more line-ups or new info, definitely not a laptop weather to update anything from the venue.

Full start for outdoor season, though at Tampere the match will be indoors. There might be a bit snowing here and there but the pitches are in good enough condition and the snow should not spoil the matches. The winners go to semifinals and to the 7th round of the Finnish Cup directly, the losers of these matches continue their season with the 6th Cup round which will be drawn next week. The winner of the League Cup gets a monetary prize but no European competition spots are available, so the importance of this Cup is not huge in that sense. No extra time will be played, straight into penalty shoot-out if the matches are at draw at FT.

Very clear home favourites in the first two matches, two others are much more even. I am planning to take both Honka and HJK, but as usual I will be hunting the optimal time and odds for these.

Honka - FF Jaro
Honka were the most entertaining club during pre-season, a plenty of goals at both ends in all matches. In the attack they are obviously i form, and as there are no more test defenders any more also the defence is likely to be more tight. Honka have not played in this competition for weeks because they were the first to finish their schedule and go off to a camp in Turkey. Honka are well-prepared and again one of the favourites to win this cup and the League. Jaro played their last match last weekend away at JJK and lost 1-0. Team news at Honka tell about only long-term mf Vasara being missed and there are more than 20 players to choose from. At Jaro there are a few injuries and also some players are playing with the reserves. If Honka have been concentrating at least a bit into defence since the group phase this should be a clear home win. If you think about live betting as I do you have to keep in mind that in the group phase Honka conceded the first goal 5 times out 6, and was even 3 goals behind MyPa and 2 behind Haka. -0.75 @ 1.66 is not what I want to get from this, a bigger hc with bigger odds suits me ok, or the same -0.75 in live betting.



HJK - KuPS
HJK will be without mf Yobe who was arrested for manipulating results, but they got Finnish legend Jari Litmanen instead.  KuPS have been missing defenders lately and the same applies today as Joenmäki and Holopainen are out, along with midfielders Oravainen and Hynynen. 1st choice gk Vilmunen is a questionmark. KuPS test new striker from Ghana (or was it Guinea?), but under these circumstances home win looks very likely. HJK are at -1.25 @ 1.93 and I took it now as HJK odds usually drop further towards kick-off.  I will be there myself today but it might be there is no better chance to take it today even live. HJK have had their problems when in lead, but they have also started the matches well.

TamU - TPS
TamU are unbeaten since Lahti Cup final in January vs KuPS, but it tells more about the poor quality of the Northern Group in the cup than of anything else. They have also been linked to this Singaporean match fixer discussed yesterday and perhaps all is not that well at Tampere either? TamU miss a couple of strikers due injury. TPS have lost their last two matches 0-4 vs Inter and Djurgården, and they lack attacking options a lot, but there should be two new strikers at test. Despite being indoors this match smells like a low-scoring affair but depending on who TPS are missing TamU might also raise some interest. Obviously there has been  some illness and flu in the TamU camp and they have very little to offer from the bench.n Not touching this before seeing the actual line-ups, and perhaps not even after seeing them. -0,25 @ 2.15 for TamU available which is a good price IF TPS are still without Kolehmainen, Nyberg and Heinikangas. IF they play I will definitely skip this with current odds.

Lineups:
TamU: 1 Mika Hilander, 4 Kristian Kojola, 5 Antti Ojanperä, 6 Jonas Emet, 7 Jari Niemi, 8 Jarkko Värttö, 9 Mika Lahtinen, 11 Aleksei Kangaskolkka, 16 Ilari Ruuth, 25 Aapo Lappalainen, 27 Johannes Mononen.

Subs: 12 Jere Pyhäränta, 10 Sergei Korsunov, 17 Antto Hilska, 21 Jonne Hjelm

TPS: 12 Jukka Lehtovaara, 2 Mikael Liespuu, 3 Kalle Mäkinen, 7 Sami Rähmönen, 8 Jarno Heinikangas, 10 Petteri Pennanen, 13 Toni Kolehmainen, 15 Ali Al Take, 19 Patrik Lomski, 23 Juho Lähde, 25 Santeri Mäkinen
Subs: 35 Henrik Moisander, 9 Janne Vuorinen, 17 Tomas Hradecky, 24 Floribert N´Galula, 31 Jere Uronen

TamU 0 @ 2.02


JJK - Inter
This is the match which shows most clearly the class difference of the two groups. I was hoping for a more even set-up and perhaps I might skip this in the end. JJK defence was in terrible shape in the group phasot e, and as they are missing today Hyyrynen and Wusu from the front it limits their attacking options to Virtanen and Manninen, personally I do see Tommi Kari as a threat to a solid Inter defence. Inter have defender Joni Aho suspended but he will be rather easily replaced. Inter not to lose this one, there is -0,25 @ 1.87 available but I am not all sure of what will be the market reaction in this and this is another match under consideration at the moment.

JJK: 30 Janne Korhonen, 2 Samu Nieminen, 5 Juha Pasoja, 6 Jukka-Pekka Tuomanen, 7 Anssi Viren, 8 Eero Korte, 9 Mikko Manninen, 14 Tamas Gruborovics, 16 Niko Markkula, 21 Zakaria Abahassine, 26 Jani Virtanen

Subs: 1 Mihaly Szerovay, 3 Mikk Reintam, 4 Jarkko Okkonen, 10 Tommi Kari, 19 Niko Kautto, 23 Patrick
Poutiainen

FC Inter: 1 Magnus Bahne, 2 Tero Mäntylä, 7 Ari Nyman, 8 Daniel Osinachi, 10 Domgoj Abramovic, 15 Severi Paajanen, 17 Mika Ojala, 22 Sami Sanevuori, 23 Ville Nikkari, 24 Joni Kauko, 29 Henri Lehtonen

Subs: 13 Eemeli Reponen, 11 Timo Furuholm, 16 Kalle Kauppi, 20 Ville Neulanen

Edit: took Inter -0.25 @ 1.95



The odds will move one way or another before the kick-offs as the line-ups will be published one by one. There are so many questionmarks regarding line-ups in most teams that I do not want to recommend any other bets at right now, but as mentioned I will probably take Honka  at some point, then Inter and TamU are the next on the waiting list depending especially what kind of team news there are from Tampere.

Planning to update this post a bit when I get more info, so stay tuned! Also a late Finnish Cup kick-off today of an interesting AC Vantaa - Viikingit possibly to follow.

Enjoy your day, it is Saturday!