Monaco v CSKA Moscow Betting Tips

Group E is incredibly tight with just three points separating bottom from top. This of course means that each match is incredibly important for all teams, even when first place plays last place as we have in this fixture on Wednesday night. All four teams still have a chance of making it through to the knockout rounds.

As well as topping Champions League Group E, Monaco are also doing well in Ligue 1 with Leonardo Jardim ‘s side second place in the league, six points behind surprise leaders Nice and ahead of oil-rich Paris Saint-Germain on goal difference.

Monaco are of course owned by a Russian, but, we can expect no sympathies towards CSKA Moscow here. Dmitry Rybolovlev is an ambitious man who is determined to kick his club on in European football after a brief stay away from the top flight a couple of years ago.

Although Monaco are doing well to be second in the league, they have hit a bit of a rocky patch of late and have not won back-to-back matches in Ligue 1 since mid-September.

On the other hand, home form has been good in all competitions with The Red and Whites having not lost a match at Stade Louis II all season.

Goals have been the backbone of Monaco’s successful season so far with 30 goals in the league and four in the Champions League. However, they face a different test against a CSKA side who are quite resilient and who managed a draw against Monaco in Moscow in the last round of Champions League matches.

CSKA Moscow have once again disappointed on the European stage this season which means they have now not won a Champions League match proper for 13 months.

Whilst manager Leonid Slutsky takes a lot of flak for his negative tactics, we must remember that the club does not have the spending power of days gone by and cannot simply go out and buy Champions League players. This means that the squad depth is poor.

When we look at CSKA’s bench, particularly for European matches, there is not a single player on there who can come on and make an impact. I would even go as far as to say that most sides in the English Championship have a better bench than CSKA Moscow at the moment.

It is not only in Europe where CSKA have disappointed, it is also in the league where the current champions currently sit in third spot, seven points off the top, after a 3-1 loss to title and city rivals Spartak Moscow at the weekend.

Igor Akinfeev was again at fault for a couple of the Spartak goals and the Russian international is still yet to keep a clean sheet in 39 Champions League matches. In fact, the match against Monaco on November 1st will be the 10-year anniversary of Akinfeev’s last clean sheet in the Champions League which came against Arsenal back in 2006. Interestingly, this was the sixth consecutive shutout by Akinfeev in European football.

This clean sheet situation is hardly ideal when going into such an important fixture as it pretty much means you need to score two to win – something I am not sure CSKA are capable of.

Away form has been horrendous for the Army Men in recent weeks with four consecutive defeats on the road, scoring just twice in those matches.

However, with Group E being so tight, if CSKA do manage to pull off a surprise win, then they are really in amongst it going into the final two group games. Somewhat of a confidence booster for Slutsky’s side.

Having said that, I cannot see passed a Monaco win here. Not only that but I imagine they will achieve it with a clean sheet. Even though Monaco may concede a few too many goals for Jardim’s liking, CSKA are pretty poor in the final third and, as previously mentioned, they have no options on the bench to go to any sort of Plan B should things go wrong.

The odds on the home side to win without conceding are in my view a rather generous 9/5.

See all of our Champions League tips here.