Krasnodar vs Porto 08/08/19

8 August 2019

Porto travel to Krasnodar Stadium to take on the Russian giants Krasnodar for the first leg of their Champions League Qualifiers tie.

Even though they’ve endured mixed fortunes in the opening four Russian Premier League (RPL) round of fixtures (W2, D1, L1), the fact that they already played four competitive games this summer gives the hosts a slight head start over Porto. While both of Krasnodar’s league wins saw them score precisely three goals per match, the Bulls have netted one goal or less in the remaining two RPL outings. Krasnodar Stadium proved to be a fortress in 2019, as the Black-Greens suffered just one defeat in nine home matches across all competitions since the turn of the year (W5, D3, L1). A potential worry for Murad Musayev could, however, be that his players have struggled to keep a clean sheet in six of their last seven games, allowing over 1.5 goals per match three times in the process.

As for the visitors, they head to Russia after sustaining a narrow 1-0 loss to AS Monaco, which was their only defeat in four summer friendlies (W2, D1, L1). Although just one of those games has produced over 2.5 goals, all of them have featured at least one goal in the first half. Porto’s indifferent road form could be a major influence here (W2, D3, L1), especially as the Dragons failed to preserve a blank slate four times across those matches. Still, Sérgio Conceição can rely on his devastating attack that has found the net in 12 consecutive games before the aforementioned encounter with Monaco.