Great Britain’s men’s football team head into their Olympic quarter-final against South Korea at Cardiff’s Millennium Stadium on Saturday evening, after a morale boosting 1-0 win over the bookmakers’ second favourites Uruguay.
Stuart Pearce’s 4-3-3 formation has put the emphasis on possession of the football, something which they enjoyed nearly 70% of against the Uruguayans. The tidy playmakers, Aaron Ramsey and Tom Cleverley (of Arsenal and Manchester United) are now at the heart of the midfield, alongside Swansea’s Joe Allen with the 38 year old Ryan Giggs sitting on the substitute’s bench against Uruguay.
The trio’s crisp and sensible passing, allied with an ability to shield and protect the ball effectively has helped Britain grow as a team, control the pace of the game, and limit the opposition to a paltry amount of chances.
In their two other Group A matches, they played out a tight 1-1 draw against a decent Senegal side, and managed to put three goals past a fairly weak United Arab Emirates outfit as the game finished 3-1.
South Korea definitely come more into the footballing class category of the Uruguayans and the Senegalese; they are an extremely physically fit team with excellent tactical discipline which can lead to them being involved in very tight and hard-fought encounters.
Apart from a crazy three goals in seven minutes in their 2-1 win over Switzerland, South Korea’s other Group B matches both ended 0-0, versus Gabon and Mexico.
The match on Saturday is a knock-out game of a fairly major international tournament so there is of course an element of unpredictability, but going off the evidence of watching these teams play over the past week, I’d say this has a very good chance of finishing with under 2.5 goals being scored at the end of 90 minutes play.
This weeks free under/over 2.5 football betting tip is below:
Olympic Football
Mens Great Britain v South Korea, 04 Aug 2012, 19:30
50 points under 2.5 goals, best odds 1.62 @ PaddyPower
or bet £10 risk free at Skybet
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