Football – England – League One Play-Off Final
Sunday 25th May 2014 – Kickoff: 1500hrs
The League One season comes to a close at Wembley this afternoon with Leyton Orient and Rotherham United battling it out for the right to stage Championship football next season.
Leyton Orient finished the regular season in third place on 86 points with an overall record of 25-11-10 85/45 with manager Russell Slade once again proving he’s one of the best managers in the lower leagues as he’s guided his O’s side to a Wembley play-off final. They are now one match away from making a long-awaited return to the Championship on this special Sunday afternoon.
Leyton Orient came through a tense encounter against Peterborough United in the play-off semi finals with a 1-1 draw at London Road followed up with a 2-1 win over The Posh at the Matchroom Stadium, but The O’s had to endure a nervy couple of minutes in injury time to hang on for the win.
In terms of likely goalscorers, Leyton Orient possess numerous attacking players capable of hitting the back of the net with leading scorer Mooney (20 goals, 7 assists), Lisbie (17 goals, 8 assists), Cox (14 goals, 14 assists) and Odubajo (12 goals, 8 assists) to name but a few, and they ended up as third highest goalscorers overall in League One behind Wolves (89) and today’s opponents Rotherham United (86).
Which leads me nicely onto The O’s’ opponents today, Rotherham United – manager Steve Evans may not be the most popular manager in League One but he has achieved a very successful season for his Millermen as they too are just ninety minutes away from Championship football.
Rotherham finished one place behind Leyton Orient in fourth place but ended up on the same 86 points, and the two teams could hardly be any closer after 46 league matches with Rotherham United ending up with an overall record of 24-14-8 86/58.
In the semi final play-offs, Rotherham produced an almost carbon copy of Leyton Orient’s passage through to the final by holding Preston North End to a 1-1 draw at Deepdale and then seeing off the Lancashire outfit 3-1 at their New York Stadium in the second leg, even after going a goal behind.
Rotherham’s likely goalscorers are Agard (22 goals), Frecklington (11 goals), Revell (9 goals, 8 assists) and Pringle (5 goals, 14 assists) whose deliveries against Preston North End caused constant havoc.
In summary, these two sides have shown their resilience over a long hard season of 48 League One matches with hardly anything between them even now – and both teams have plenty of attacking options open to them and so therefore I’ll back both sides to score today in what could be perhaps a 1-1 stalemate at the end of 90 minutes.
Pick: Both teams to score – Yes @ 1.73 bet365
