Seeley’s Selections – Barcelona v Bayern Munich

What a game we have to look forward to on Wednesday evening when Champions League favourites Barcelona host Bayern Munich at the Camp Nou.

Prodigal son Pep Guardiola returns for the first time as an opposition manager and he looks set to get a heroes reception off the pitch having guided the Spanish giants to 14 titles/trophies in his four year stint, but on the pitch it’s expected to be a very different story.

This is going to be an unhappy return for Pep as a trip to Catalonia is as tough as it gets at the best of times, but when you travel to Spain with a squad decimated by injuries it becomes mission impossible.

The Germans are certain to be without the services of Franck Ribery, Arjen Robben, David Alaba and Holger Badstuber and there is also a major concern about the fitness of Robert Lewandowski after the Polish international suffered a broken jaw and nose in the German Cup final defeat to Borussia Dortmund.

The Bundesliga champions are 17/4 to win this with BoyleSports and however good their recent record against the hosts is, please don’t let that fool you on this occasion. Munich’s preparation has been far from ideal for and they surprisingly went down 2-0 at the weekend to Bayer Leverkusen and since their injury problems, their form has suffered dramatically.

In the first leg of their quarter-final they were humiliated 3-1 by Porto in Portugal and without the counter-attacking pace of Robben and Ribery, bang goes any chance of an upset on Wednesday.

Barcelona are 7/10 to win this with BoyleSports and unlike the visitors, they arrive at this stage of the season playing their best football of the campaign and arguably their best football for a couple of years. Luis Enrique’s side smashed Cordoba 8-0 at the weekend and that was their 15th win in their last 16 matches.

They haven’t conceded a goal in over 480 minutes of football (just over five matches) and in that same period they’ve managed to score a staggering 23 goals.

A win for them to nil against this patched up Bayern side looks reasonable at the 19/10 with BoyleSports.

The last Champions League semi-final between these two sides in 2012-13 ended in an embarrassing 7-0 aggregate defeat for the Spaniards and that will be firmly in their minds on Wednesday and this is a perfect opportunity for revenge.

Barcelona have won eight successive Champions League games for the first time since 2002/03 and they have done so in a canter scoring 20 goals in that period and I’m expecting them to cruise through this one by a 2-0 margin which looks decent at 7/1 with BoyleSports.

The home side’s front three of Neymar, Luis Suarez and Lionel Messi are unplayable at the moment and between that trio they’ve scored a staggering 11 goals in their last two games. Messi though is still the main man in Catalonia and the little maestro has been involved in three of Barcelona’s last five goals against Bayern in the Champions League.

With eight goals already in the competition and the Champions League top goalscorer trophy in his sights, I like the 10/3 with BoyleSports on the Argentinian to yet again open the scoring in this one.

B Lucky!

Seeley’s Selections:
Barcelona To Win @ 7/10
Barcelona To Win To Nil @ 19/10
Correct Score: Barcelona 2-0 @ 7/1
Lionel Messi First Goalscorer @ 10/3

*Prices correct at time of publication