3 reasons why England are heading for a Scotland shellacking
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England are on quite the winning run since the World Cup having bested each of their last five opponents, and after beating ancient rivals Scotland in five of their last six clashes, Roy Hodgson’s charges go into the Parkhead friendly against Gordon Strachan’s men as 6/5 favourites.
That’s not all she wrote though, as there are ample reasons to believe the hosts can pull off a 13/5 shock, with three outlined below.
Scotland have won three of their past four at home and last conceded on their own patch over a year ago
Croatia, Georgia and Republic of Ireland have all been seen off by Strachan’s team without scoring in the Tartan Army’s past three competitive fixtures.
A USA side that went on to outperform expectations at the World Cup couldn’t breach the Scots’ rearguard in a 0-0 draw a year ago either, meaning only Belgium have left Glasgow with a win over the past 18 months.
Strachan’s men have been decent on the road too, with only Germany getting the better of them over the past 10 fixtures all told
Scotland’s resurgence under the former Celtic gaffer has been remarkable; a side that couldn’t down Macedonia at home just over two years ago has since beaten said opponents on the road, as well as Croatia and Poland.
A 2-1 loss to the newly-crowned world champions, which only came about following Ikechi Anya equaliser after an hour for the visitors in Dortmund, is the only blot on Scotland’s copybook in over 14 months.
England may be on a five-game winning run since the World Cup, but they’ve hardly been great
Bar an eye-catching 2-0 win over Switzerland in Basel two months ago, Hodgson’s men have been far from impressive since flying home from Brazil without a win over the summer.
In three of their five recent wins, it has taken England at least 59 minutes to get on the scoresheet, and they only kicked into gear last time out at Wembley after Jordan Henderson’s own goal had given Slovenia a second-half lead.
Expect Scotland to capitalise on such sloppiness at Parkhead.
All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.
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