Over The Goals For Spanish Super Cup Glory

It’s a Madrid Derby in the Spanish Super Final As Real and Atletico go head-to-head in the first leg on Tuesday night.

Form
Real Madrid have already lifted one trophy this season, when they beat Sevilla 2-0 in the UEFA Super Cup in Cardiff on Tuesday night, now attentions turn to the Spanish Super Cup where they take on city rivals Atletico Madrid.

The Spanish Super Cup is often a more fiercely contested affair than its English equivalent, the Community Shield, and will be even more so this summer as Real look to reassert their superiority over the La Liga champions following another summer of big money signings.

Cristiano Ronaldo, showing no signs of the injury that plagued his World Cup, scored both goals in the midweek win. There now seems to be an advanced understanding between the Portuguese and Gareth Bale, who has also scored a couple of goals in a disconcerting pre-season for Los Blancos. Carlo Ancelotti’s men have endured defeats to Manchester Untied and Roma and were held to a 1-1 draw by Inter prior to the UEFA Super Cup match.

Atletico have had a much more encouraging pre-season, beating Wolfsburg 5-1 and drawing with Galatasaray 0-0 before weekend wins against Sampdoria and Cadiz.

Team News
Summer signings James Rodriguez and Toni Kroos will make their Bernabeu debuts. As mentioned above, Ronaldo looked to be back to full fitness in Cardiff last week and after playing the full 90 minutes is expected to also start this one.

Last season’s top scorer Diego Costa leaves a big hole in Atleti’s attack, but the arrival of Mario Mandzukic, signed from Bayern Munich, should go someway towards plugging that gap. Mario Suarez was back in action at the weekend after picking up a serious head injury in the recent friendly with Wolfsburg.

Head-to-Head
Real Madrid left it late when the two teams met in the Champions League final less than three months ago. Sergio Ramos’ 90th minute equaliser took the game to extra time before the now European champions ran out 4-1 winners.

Of the other four meetings between the two teams last season – two in the Copa Del Rey – Real Madrid won two, Atletico one and the other ended in a 2-2 draw.

Recommended Bets
There wasn’t a great deal between these two sides last season – just three points in the end-of-season table – but each club’s relative summer transfer activity means that there is expected to be a substantial shift in power back towards the Bernabeu this campaign.

Real go into this game as 8/15 favourites, and on home soil I’d say that’s a fair price. The draw is priced at odds of 10/3 and an Atleti win is 5/1.

However, it’s the goals markets where I will focus my betting attention for this one.

The Super Cup generally tends to produce goals – 33 have been scored in the last five years (10 games)

and with Real Madrid having further added to their attacking options in the summer they’ll want to showcase their options in the first home game of the new season. Back Over 3.5 goals at odds of 29/20.