On Sunday afternoon, Real Betis will host Athletic Bilbao in Estadio Benito Villamarín and both want to find the way out of stucking midfield with a win out of this match.
Real Betis with a suprising season start
Real Betis is back in Spains highest league since this season and they are currently placed on 10th position what is a real success for Betis. However, today's hosts have not had the best of starts to their campaign. In nine matches thus far, Betis has managed three wins, three draws and three losses are on their account to this date. And hopefully, they will want to add another win before the winter break and at home against Bilbao will be one of the only few opportunitites to do so.
In last match, Betis didn't played as good as they can and so at the end against Granda the scoreboard only shown a 1-1. Betis only scored the goal thanks to a penalty which Ruben Castro converted. Overall, the hosts were the better team and Betis only got a point with some luck. Granda had 17 shots and the guest only 7. So, if Granda's conversion of chances were not so bad at this day, Betis would definitely got zero points out of this match.
Bilbao want to find back their way to upper level in league
On the other hand, Athletic Bilbao had a bad season start by their standards and now the Basques want to do everything in the Betis match to get out of the stucking midfield and attack the upper teams and fight against them for an European place. It is only the 10th matchday so Bilbao have still enough time to offset their season start, but it would be good for the team, also to rise up their morale, if they can start a little run before the turn of the year.
In previous meeting against Sporting Gijón, Bilbao went home with a 3-0 won over the other promoted team and Aduriz was the man of the match once again. The 34-year-old scored a brace and was next to Susaeta, who scored the interim 1-0 lead, happy about his own performance. They completely dominated that match as it looks like Bilbao are starting to become their normal selves again and are sitting in 12th now, having won three of their last four matches in all competitions.
Prediction
Real Betis count as one of the most suprising teams this Primera División season and definitely have a chance to beat Atheltic Bilbao at home. Bilbao won against Partizan Belgrade with 0-2 in the week and might have tired legs, but espacially Aduriz is dangerous at any time and Betis' defenders Heiko Westermann and Bruno Gonzalez have to be careful and highly-concentraded to save their own goal.