Costa Rica V Nicaragua
Monday 17 June 2019 – 01:00 GMT
International, CONCACAF Gold Cup
Pick: Both Teams to Score @ 13/8 Betfair
Costa Rica will be hoping to utilise home advantage in their opening fixture of the 2019 CONCACAF Gold Cup when they welcome Nicaragua to Estadio Nacional de Costa Rica in the Costa Rican capital of San Jose.
Costa Rica 1/8 Draw 11/2 Nicaragua 15/1 – Betfair
Recent Trends
- The FIFA Rankings place Costa Rica at 39 with Nicaragua down in 129.
- Costa Rica have won four of the last five meetings with Nicaragua, all without conceding a goal.
- However, Costa Rica have kept just one clean sheet in their previous ten matches.
Costa Rica Preview
A former three-time Gold Cup champion they certainly are but the truth is Costa Rica have rarely come close to a fourth title, reaching only one final since their last triumph all the way back in 1989. They are third favourites to end their drought this time. Only the two North American powerhouses of USA and Mexico are ahead of them in the betting.
Their odds to win the tournament say a lot about the rest of the competition because this Costa Rica team are in woeful form, and have been for a long time now. They were dumped out of last summer’s World Cup after only managing to collect one point from matches with Brazil, Serbia and Switzerland. Since then their form has been erratic at best: W3 L7.
Momentum appeared to be changing for the better at the end of 2018 with a couple of exciting 3-2 victories over Chile and Peru. However, 2019 makes for very grim reading with defeats to USA (2-0), Peru (1-0) and even a team ranked 145 in the world in Guatemala (1-0) offsetting a narrow 1-0 win at home to Jamaica.
It’s fair to assume confidence within camp will not be high, especially for a defence that has kept only one clean sheet in its past ten matches.
Nicaragua Preview
Unfortunately, from a betting perspective, Nicaragua are unlikely to strike fear into their out of sorts opponent. This is a nation who are relative novices when it comes to competing in a Gold Cup, with this being just their third experience of the tournament in more than half a century. It is therefore, with very good reason, they are considered to be 125/1 outsiders.
A point from any of their group matches would be considered a significant achievement when you take into account that they failed to do so in either of their last two appearances. They did at least manage to register their first goal in a Gold Cup last time around in a 2-1 defeat to Panama. The manner in which Costa Rica have been leaking goals in the past twelve months means it wouldn’t be unthinkable for Nicaragua to double their tally here.
Recent form would suggest they can be optimistic about that objective at least – only Haiti have denied the team nicnknamed Los Pinoleros from scoring in their past eight matches. Many of those were against very weak opposition it must be said, but a 2-2 draw with Bolivia earlier in the year is creditable, while they did sneak a goal past Argentina via the penalty spot in a recent friendly, albeit in a heavy 5-1 loss.
Betting Conclusion
There is a difference of 90 places separating these two nations in the latest FIFA rankings, so it’s unsurprising to see Costa Rica priced as strong favourites. On current form, though, I couldn’t be overly confident backing them at such short odds. Their defence has seriously struggled for clean sheets of late and it could pay to stick with that trend here.
