Europa League
The last 32 knock out stages of the Europa League begin today and there are three Premier League teams taking part. Liverpool and Spurs both progressed through the group stages of this competition whilst Man Utd finished third in their Champions League group, which means they dropped into the Europa League.
Liverpool travel to Germany to play Augsburg who currently sit in 14th place in the Bundesliga and are having a poor season. Liverpool have been bolstered over the past week with the return to fitness of Coutinho, Sturrdige and Origi which makes a massive difference to the attacking abilities of the team. If Sturridge and Coutinho can now stay fit, they should have a strong finish to the season. They are a much stronger team than Augsburg on paper and I fully expect them to qualify for the next round. With the added pace they now have in their team Liverpool will be perfectly set up to press Augsburg and hit them on the break so I think at best price 23/20 they are a good value bet to take a lead back to Anfield for next weeks second leg.
Man Utd travel to Denmark to play FC Midtjylland who are probably the weakest team left in the competition. Utd's form of late hasn't been particularly good but they should have far too much for their Danish counterparts and I think they will win pretty comfortably tonight. A price of 8/11 on them winning doesn't make much appeal but if they go in front early on I can see them scoring two or three so I think it is worth a punt on Utd at minus one on the handicap.
Spurs have the toughest draw of the three English teams as they play Italian club Fiorentina who are third place in Serie A. They knocked Spurs out the this competition last season and it would be no surprise to see them do so again. With Tottenham in such a good position in the Premier League I think Pochettino may treat this competition as a chance to rotate a few players and use his squad as he will want to avoid the risk of injuries to key players like Kane and Alderwiereld. Due to this I think Fiorentina have a great chance to win the home leg and a price of 19/13 represents a nice bit of value.
Today's Selections
Augsburg v Liverpool - Liverpool win - 2 points @ 23/20 (Betfred)
FC Midtjylland v Man Utd - Utd minus one - 1 point @ 2/1 (Paddy Power)
Treble - Liverpool, Utd and Fiorentina - 1 point @ 8.05 (Paddy Power)