Goianésia and Anápolis face each other on the afternoon of this Wednesday, January 17, 2024, starting at 1:30 pm in a game valid for the 1st round of the Goiano Championship.
Goianésia
The Goianésia team will play an official match again this week, which has not happened since February last year, when it suffered an early elimination in the first phase of the Goiano Championship.
On that occasion, Goianésia faced the good Atlético-GO team and ended up getting the worst of it by losing 3-0 in a crushing way, highlighting the huge competitive disparity between the team from the interior of Goiás and the team from the capital.
However, their campaign also had positive points as they managed to avoid relegation to the second division and thus achieve the main objective of their season, which was to remain in the state elite even with an investment below that of several competitors.
However, Goianésia does not expect to have an easy time trying to repeat such a feat and knows the importance of winning games at home in order to accumulate precious points in the fight for survival or even secure an unlikely place in the next phase of the tournament.
Only 1 victory, no draw and 4 defeats were recorded in the last 5 official matches, beating Anápolis itself, its opponent at the time, in addition to losing to Iporá, Vila Nova, Goiás and also to Atlético-GO.
Acting as home team, the Goianésia team recorded a recent campaign with 4 wins, 1 draw and 5 defeats in the last 10 matches played.
Anápolis
While on the other side is the Anápolis team, which is also from the interior of Goiás, but had a fuller calendar last season by remaining active until August.
This is because the team competed in Series D of the Brazilian Championship and reached the round of 16 of the tournament, even dreaming of promotion to the third national division, however, their dream was interrupted when they got the worst of the match against Ferroviária, by 2 to 0 on aggregate, losing both matches in question by the same score of 1 to 0.
Their ambition for this edition of the Campeonato Goiano is to try to secure a place in Series D of the Brazilian Championship again and they arrives confident.
There were 2 wins, 1 draw and 2 defeats in the last 5 official matches, beating Real Ariquemes and Democrat-GV, in addition to drawing with Democrat-GV and losing to Ferroviária twice.
Playing as a visitor, the Anápolis team had a recent campaign with just 1 win, 7 draws and 2 defeats in the last 10 matches played.
Conclusion:
Even considered as underdogs for playing away from home, Anápolis should give Goianésia a hard time in this opening round and I believe they will live up to a certain amount of prior favoritism due to having a technically more qualified squad, with total conditions to surprise as a visitor and having good odds.