Bundesliga: Bayer Leverkusen vs. Koln Betting Preview, Odds and Prediction

It is “do or die” for Leverkusen in this one. Bayer has to win in order to stay in the Champions League race, and it seems that they now have a perfect opportunity to do so. Injury-crippled Koln is coming to town, with the Billy Goats being terrible since the comeback. They are arguably one of the worst teams in Bundesliga right now, and on top of that, their injury list is long.

Preview 

Leverkusen (-200) has to win and jump over Borussia Monchengladbach, seizing place No.4. With two rounds to go after this event, their chances for keeping that spot and the Champions League ticket would be enormous, and that is something they were after since the campaign started. 

By participating in the most prominent competition on the continent, the entire situation in the club is going to be different than once playing in the Europa League. 

Bayer is oscillating very much at the moment, and they played 1-1 in Gelsenkirchen last weekend against Schalke. Prior to that, they eliminated Saarbrucken in the semis of DFB Pokal on the road, 0-3. 

Koln (+500) is in very poor shape, with just three points since the restart. They haven’t won during the entire time, and their record is three draws and five losses. 

What is interesting is that all those matches ended with high efficiency and with goals on both sides. To be exact, four out of six saw over 3.5 goals, and Koln even managed to net twice in three games. So we need to say that Billy Goats want to play, it is just that they want to play, but don’t have any luck, or focus in defense. 

With 35 points, Koln is seven steps ahead of Dusseldorf who is under the red line, and they now need to win at least one game until the end to be theoretically safe in Bundesliga. 

Latest News

Kai Havertz should play this match, but his situation is very unclear at the moment, meaning that he could change his mind anytime and skip the event. Alario is definitely out, same as Bellarabi and Bender. Palacios is ill and doubtful.

On the other side, we have Hauptmann, Jakobs, Katterbach, Russe, and Terodde, who are definitely not playing this game. Thielmann is questionable due to his muscle injury. 

Head to Head Games

Koln won the opening clash of the campaign with 2-0 at home. Both goals came in the latter stage of the event with Cordoba opening the show, and Bornauw confirming the win. The last time Bayer played at home against Koln, the result was 2-1, but that was in 2017.

Prediction

The hosts are the favorites for several reasons but two stands above. They are in a must-win situation, because of the Champions League spot, which is No.1. The second reason is Koln’s poor shape, as they can’t win in recent times. Because of all that betting on the hosts is logical, but in order to increase the odds, we would add Bayer to win and to score two goals. The moneyline for this one is at -125.