Ajax will look for revenge on Thursday in the second meeting with AS Roma. The first game resulted in a 1-2 loss, despite a real rain of opportunities, including a missed penalty kick by captain Dusan Tadic. Nevertheless, this first match and the shape of the Amsterdam club in European duels offers enough tools to refuel and turn the second duel with Roma into a victory. In collaboration with TOTO, we look ahead to the return game between Ajax and Roma.
Roma embarrassed Ajax by ending the winning streak of 24 matches in all competitions. The team of trainer Erik ten Hag won all knockout matches until the final game. The chance of the next round in the Europa League does not seem to be gone. During two of the last three times that Ajax lost a first meeting in a European main tournament, they managed to advance to the next round. In the 2016/17 season, the leader in the Eredivisie defeated FC Copenhagen in the eighth final of the Europa League (2-0 after a 2-1 defeat in Denmark) and in the 2018/19 season a 2-1 home defeat was against Real Madrid brushed away in a memorable Champions League match: 1-4. Ajax does not have to shy away from European duels under Ten Hag. Of the last fourteen matches outside the Netherlands, eight were won and only two were lost (against Liverpool and Getafe).
Do you think Ajax will continue to the next round? View the odds for Ajax that will proceed to the semi-finals of the Europa League here.
Are you less sure of an Ajax victory? Then you can always bet on a good number of goals. The club from Amsterdam needs at least two to continue. The game already showed that the only Dutch Europa League participant clearly has no trouble creating opportunities. Despite the fact that Ajax was only accurate once, the team should have scored 3.2 times based on Expected Goals (xG), while opponent Roma only came to 0.7 xG. A huge difference that we have not seen since November 2018 in a losing team in the Europa League (FC Astana against Dynamo Kiev, xG of 2.6). The last European duels also provide guidance for a goal-rich match: Ajax scored twice or more in ten of the last fourteen European duels. Of the last nineteen duels in all competitions, only a visit to Liverpool (1-0 defeat) did not score, which is of course no shame.
Do you think Ajax will score twice or more against Roma? View the odds for multiple goals from Ajax here.
The Amsterdam team must ensure that it is less sloppy defensively than in the first game. Although many players are still missing at Roma, Henrikh Mkhitaryan returns a dangerous name in the match selection of i Giallorossi. Mkhitaryan has been involved in the most goals scored for Roma in all competitions this season, with eleven goals and nine assists. Moreover, the Armenian knows what it is like to score against Ajax, because during the Europa League final of 2017 he made the 0-2 on behalf of Manchester United against Thursday’s opponent.
Do you think Henrikh Mkhitaryan will score? View the odds for a goal by the Armenian here.
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