Racing Club vs Belgrano

Racing club welcome Belgrano for this Argentinian Liga Profesional opening round at Estadio Juan Domingo Perón in Avellaneda early Monday morning Beijing time. This league is of lower level as a whole by international standards than many football fans probably realize - taking into account what an awesome football country Argentina is in terms of football culture and – of course, Argentina lifted the World Cup trophy last month in Qatar! There is a massive difference between the two teams in terms of pure class – in all areas of the game. They finished in second place last season and were very strong in most games! The netted the ball 41 times – this was the second-highest number in Liga Profesional. They allowed 24 goals and I see them having potential to improve further in this area of the game. They grabbed a total of 50 points - just two points behind Boca Juniors – one of the two giants of Argentinian football in terms of historical success, overall financial resources and players total market value. River Plate, another of these giants finished in third place. Belgrano, on the other hand, were promoted from Primera Nacional for this season and I expected them to do worse than most football journalists and the betting market. The pace and players' individual skill-level in this league are overall much higher than at the second tier. I am not sure if the bookmakers give this factor enough emphasis..

According to a very well-known and respected German website, Transfermarkt.com, Racing Club players have a total market value of over 40 million euros. In my opinion this is a bit too low.. I would set the number at around 46-48 million.. I would not be surprised to see them fighting for the championship again this season! In their most recent match they defeated Boca Juniors 2-1 after a very solid performance recording more goal attempts, shots on goal, total passes and completed passes. The visitors' players have a total market value of just 12.18 million which is too high and is low by Liga Profesional standards. At least four players are over-valued. The total market value can, of course, sometimes be misleading but is still a relatively good indicator of a team's level in real action on the pitch.. The football (player) market is, after all, a global one.. The sharp bookmakers, football journalists/analysts and particularly professional football bettors pay increasingly more attention to teams' total market values these days.. However, if two players are equally capable and one of them is 25 years old and the other one is 35, the younger one is, of course, much more valuable.. For example, World Champion Leo Messi or Barcelona's Polish super star Robert Lewandowski do not have even close to the biggest current market value despite being top-8 players on the planet! Furthermore, for example super-promising Englishman Jude Bellingham, just 19 years old, has a significantly higher market value than the legendary super stars Messi or Lewadowski at the moment.. Let's remember that Racing Club finished the last season very well winning 7/9 matches. In the last match of the season they were unlucky to lose to River Plate 1-2 at home after recording more goal attempts, shots on goal, attacks and dangerous attacks. They have a close to 70% chance of winning this game in front of very loud and loyal fans! Belgrano won most of their matches at the end of last season but were overall not as convincing as the league table would suggest.. Let's not forget that the difference between the first and second tier is massive!