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I am already a bit boring with Slavia Prague and with the glorification of their defense, but as long as the betting houses are giving good odds on under of their opponents goals, why not take it? Let's start with dry numbers. In the seven games they played so far, Slavia conceded more than one goal only once in the unusual game against Chomutov. Coach Ruzicka himself says that he doesn't like these kinds of games and that he prefers matches (and victories) with less goals. On the other hand, in the seven games they've played so far,Liberec scored more than two goals on two occasions - against offensively oriented Trinec and Sparta. After the game against Sparta, where they scored six goals, the White tigers have started to struggle and scored only two goals in the next three games. The thing that should worry coach Hynek the most is the lack of idea in their game during those three matches. They had only 21 shots on goal against Kometa, 18 against Karlovy Vary, and against Kladno they scored only one goal from 37 shots. Details

As the title indicates, Nitra at home and Nitra away are two different teams. How powerful they can be in the offense was felt by Martin two rounds ago which went home with seven goals conceded. Dukla is roughly on the same level in quality, even below Martin and even though it is hard to expect such crushing score again, the team of Antonin Stavjana definitely has the quality and performance to win against this Dukla with at least two goals margin. Nitra covered for this handicap in both home matches and so did Dukla, in a negative sense, who lost with three and five goals difference in two away matches (their third away match was against Orange, they won it through penalty shootout and they were losing with two goals margin until last ten minutes). Be that as it may, Nitra know how to ambush their opponents and go with force from the first minute. Such are the announcements ahead of this match too and the young boys in the defense of Dukla could fall under such pressure. Nothing needs to be said about the atmosphere in Nitra's arena, probably the best in Slovakia. If anyone wants to, they can play at Marathon for a spread -1 with odds 1.75 with returns if it ends with one goal difference. Details

I believe the preview itself leans towards this pick. Vitkovice don't know how, and more importantly, don't want to play any way other than offensively, rather ignoring their defense, and Chomutov have shown they pack quite a punch in their last two games. A team that manages to fill Slavia's net with six goals, regardless of how relaxed the opponent might have been, definitely deserves my trust. As for Vitkovice, repeating the preview will suffice - the worst defense in the league (along with Chomutov). Chomutov scored 10 goals in their last two games, and while the testing sample might be too small to call them a very strong offensive team right away, they do show signs of shaping up to become one. They went over the margin in three of their six games, stayed at exactly 2 twice, but what is more important to me, Vitkovice took more than 2 in four of their six games, and stayed at exactly 2 in two more. That means they did not fail when it comes to this margin. Details

In their home games so far, Znojmo welcomed the three best offenses of the league, Viktoria from Plzen, Teplice and Sparta Prague. We can add Slavia Prague to that group as well, as they have a pretty decent offensive lineup, which only failed to perform on the field so far. My point? Of those four matches, only Sparta managed to score more than a single goal against them (2). What sounds even more unbelievable is that the new team of the league did not manage a single goal in those four home games. Of course, all four home games ended with under 2.5 goals. Mlada Boleslav may play a good offense, but are not on par with the above mentioned teams, so I do not expect them to demolish Znojmo, who are a very tough nut to crack at home. Mlada Boleslav have a good defensive setup themselves, with only Sparta taking less then they did, as they gave away only seven goals over nine matches. They took three in four away games, staying under this margin twice, and going over it twice as well. But, that happened in their duel with Slavia, when they scored four goals, which I don't see happening today, and vs Banik when they took two, which is also unlikely as Znojmo have so far, I'll remind you, not scored a single goal in home games. Details

There is no need to introduce Slavia with too many words as this is a team that showed a simply fantastic defensive play in the first five games, while the fact they have conceded only four goals so far can largely be attributed to their amazing goaltender Furch who is at 97.24%. Chomutov, with the exception of four goals against defensively poor Trinec, went over this margin only once, against Sparta at home, but they only managed to score that third goal two minutes before the end, after Sparta opened up completely. Nothing similar should happen today, since I don't expect for the Prague team to find themselves chasing Chomutov's lead. Besides, an indicator that Slavia's defensive play doesn't suit the Pirates is the last season, in which Ruzicka's team won all four games against Chomutov with a 17-2 goal difference! Details

If there is a conclusion to be drawn from the first few rounds it's the fact that neither Poprad nor Trencin will have a great season in terms of defense. Trencim have well-known problems, and apart from 2-3 more experienced players the rest are all inexperienced guys with little or no experienced and not even the experienced Lasak can fix that. Poprad's goalies Sidor and Srnec are no good and their defense is not looking impressive. Above all, Poprad concede 3.9 goals on average each game, and Trencin concede 3.27, bearing in mind that they average 4 conceded goals when away. The offense is a much better aspect for both teams. Poprad are lead by the experienced Krotak, followed by Jabrocky, Mlynarovic, Takac and they have got their confidence when they demolished Orange 20 yesterday. Dukla's offense is lead by the world champions Pavlikovsky and Petrovicky, along with Kominek and T. Klima, and are capable of scoring 1-2 goals against each team, which has been their M.O. so far. The ice rink in Poprad is narrower than anywhere else and there is no room for hesitation and they players need to be quick with the puck which means the more inexperienced guests might have problems there. To conclude, both teams have had over 5.5 goals in four of their last five games which speaks volumes about their game style. Details

Sparta lost their last two away matches but I think that could be a good thing for them today. At least they won't underestimate their opponents. Energia managed to win against Chomutov in the first round and after that they lost all of their matches by at least 2-goal difference. Also, in their 0-3 defeat in the home match against Hradec Kralov they only had 12 shots on goal! When you look at the names of the players playing for Karlovy Vary and Sparta there is no doubt that the away team is a lot better. So, although the bookmakers are adjusting the odd in favor of Sparta winning as we speak, I still see the value in this bet. I think that the maximum odd on Sparta to win should be around 1.60. The odds are probably a bit higher because they failed to win their last two away matches, but that doesn't really concern me. They underperformed in those matches and they are capable for performing a lot better than that. They scored five goals in their last away loss to Liberec and Liberec are a lot better team than their today's opponent. I doubt that Energia can score 3-4 goals especially as they scored a total of five in the first four rounds. Betting on Sparta scoring more than three goals also seems like a smart move to me. Marathon estimates the odds for that happening at 2.12 with the money-back guarantee if Sparta scores exactly three goals. Details

I would disagree with the bookmakers and would'n underestimate Slavia's team so much. It's true, their results weren't so great lately, but they changed their coach and that always brings some changes in the squad in terms of motivation, attitude etc. In addition to that, Slavia doesn't have poor squad, the only problem is that they aren't playing the way they should. To be honest, Jablonec are also not playing very well; they have two defeats in a row (three if we count in the defeat against Betis in Europa League), and their coach complains that he had only 13 players on last training session. There are no information about who will start the match, and who won't, but I doubt that all of the missing players will return, as well as those who manage to recover will be in "top" condition. Jablonec managed to record just one home victory when playing at home, and that one was with the minimal margin, and Slavia on the other hand have won their two away matches out of four they played so far, and they lost on two occasions (away) with minimal margin. So, neither Jablonec covered this handicap, nor Slavia lost with handicap, and in the case of Slavia's minimal defeat we have return of funds, even though I'm confident that Slavia will at least scrape a point from this one. For me this is much more even match than the odds suggest. Details

Zlin did not start the season in the best way, but this is a great opportunity to get some wind in their backs. Their guest will be the weakest team of the Czech Extraleague. Zlin covered this handicap in both of the matches on their home ice in the last championship and Karlovy Vary looked much better then, especially in the offence. Zlin's team is intact in the offense, the defense is getting around, but that should not be a problem against Energie. In the match against Mountfield they had only 12 shoots to the goal. The value in this bet lies in the following: Option that home team will score more than 2.5 goals is a miserable 1.40-1.50, so if it's so certain that Zlin will score more than three, and if we take into consideration Energie's weak offense, then it's logical to bet on their victory by two goals difference which is payed with 1.97 with a return if they win with a one goal difference. Details

I believe our local bookmakers have better guessed odds for under 5.5 goals than international ones. We have duel of two teams that have had excellent defensive performances in the first three rounds. Zilina have not conceded more than two goals (2, 2, 1) and they have their goalie Laco to thank for that, as he's been excellent lately. On average, he concedes 1.68 goals per game and has 95.24 % saves out of 35 shots per game. Everyone who has been following Medvescak will know what Robert Kristan is capable of, the man guarding the net of Nitra. He has had a solid 92.21 % saves and averaged 2.02 goals per game. His defense is a big asset as they allowed only 77 shots in 3 games, the lowest figure in the league. All in all, I expect a hard game of two very even teams that have offensive assets but we will probably not see a goal-fest here. Details

I have to admit that I was a little bit surprised by the odds the bookmakers offered for this game for total goals scored. Especially that the under for the away team is at a great 1.88 in Marathonbet. They must have been looking at their form in the last two games, where they scored eight, but we need to take three thing in account. Firstly, Pardubice played with teams that play a more open type of hockey than Slavia. Secondly, Pardubice have scored more than 2.5 goals only once in their four games against Slavia last season. That was in Pardubice, when they scored five. In the remaining three they scored 2 at home and 0 and 1 away. And thirdly, the last two matches of Slavia have shown that Ruzicka's team is really impressive defensively.
Pardubice are an offensively orientated team, but their coach won't take a lot of risks, and will probably think how to defend his goal rather then attack the opponents. Especially because he is aware, what can be seen from his statement, that Slavia's defense is difficult to overcome, and he won't risk a more open game where a goal or two conceded would mean that a chance for a positive result is very slim. Details

Nitra was a good customer to the Slovan's players in the last season as well, and they aparently had a better team then. This current team is, not to use an uglier word, horrible. The dilemma regarding this game was this: home team's win with more than 2.5 goals in the game (bwin@1.75) or more than 2.5 home team's goals. I decided for the second option, because even the first one would hardly pass without Slovan scoring three goals, since Nitra's offense is pretty bad. And Unibet is paying really well for this second option. Yes, you could always say why would they chase the third goal if they're 2-0 in the lead? They didn't have to do that last season either, but they won at home with 4-0 and 5-1, and 3-0 in an away game. Slovan is the most potent offensive team in the league, and after two games in front of empty stands, they will be playing in front of supporters again, and that is definitely an extra motive. They've already gone over this margin twice this season, they stayed under three times, but they missed everything against DAC, and the game against Senice was a derby. And they were up 2-0 against ViOn in front of empty stands. But, more important thing for me right now is what Nitra's defense looks like - in four out of five away games they conceded four goals (Trencin, Kosice, Zilina and Dukla BB). They were under that only against equally bad DAC, they conceded only one goal and lost. Details

The high odds for Skalica to go over 2.5 goals (in my opinion) are a direct effect of their poor result from the first round. The one goal they scored against Martin is surely not a realistic indication of capability of the team. In that duel they had lots of chances they did not turn into goals, but I think that we should not expect them to miss as much in every round. Banska kept Piestany under that margin in the away match. They conceded only 2 goals in the regular part of the game and goalkeeper Kalembo was great on goal. I do not have a lot of respect for a defense that let Piestany, which is known as a defensive team, take 43 shots on goal. Clearly there are a lot of holes in their game. Skalica is much better playing offence than Piestany and they should take advantage of this fact even if Kalemo has another good performance. I do not want to consider the last season's results as a reference because in the first part of the season the boys from Banska Bystrica had some experienced NHL players in their team while this year they have a young and inexperienced team. Details

Even the coach of Piestany said after the victory against Orange that his players don't like to play with a lot of contact. Banska Bystrica will play like that, they have a young team and are very aggressive. They don't have as much quality or creativity, but a lot of strength, aggressiveness and determination. Piestany showed last season that their defensive game is their best asset. They have shown in the opening of this season that it is still the foundation of their strategy. Banska will hold back and wait for their chance through counterattacks. Piestany don't have very offensive players, so their attacks could be stopped by the defence of Banska, which has a lot of potential despite their age. They also have a very good goalkeeper in Kalemba. The odds have in some betting shops fallen below 1.70, so I would take this 1.95 from Marathon in a heartbeat. The stake should maybe be an unit lower because it is still the start of the season.
Also, a great bet would be that the away team won't score more than 3 goals, which is at 1.70. Details

I have considered different options for this game, but handicap seems like a most likely outcome. I accept the fact that Sparta are not in top form, but it would be crazy to expect that because it's only the first round. Even like this they showed good game, especially on the home ice where they had a 100% successful performance and they conquered handicap on three or four occasions. Against Jyvaskila they had 3-0 and 4-1 lead and then won the penalty shootout. I don't expect to see this type of relaxation in the champioship because the team is aware of the great expectations and they will want to open the season accordingly to their reputation - mightily. Individual quality is on the side of the home team. Mountfield showed in the pre-season that they, with departures of forward Kotalik and goalie Kovar, don't have a team that can adequately resist better teams. Which Sparta most definitely is. Details

What is the primary goal of every coach after he takes over the team losing the ground beneath its feet? Of course, not losing a match. And you can be sure that coach Kotal will set up his team this way in the guest game against Dukla (the announced formation 4-5-1 is another proof). Dukla is known as the combinatorics-prone team, and with filling the midfield, the coach of Zbroiovka will try to take away its strongest trump card. Already on a few occasions Dukla has showed that it has problems with scoring when the opponent stands firm and plays a more closed game, and Brno will certainly show up with this style. The indication of what kind of team it will be could have already been seen in the friendly match against Senica, which finished with Brno's 1-0 victory. It is still not the team with quality attackers, and it is dubious there would be three scores in the game. In case there are, only half of the bet is lost in this Asian handicap. Details

Due to Trinec's reputation, I expected that the Over 5.5 goals odds would be at 1.6-1.7. The reason for this is that even though coach Kalous is trying to enforce discipline in their defense, things don't change over night. Besides, strengthening their defense does not necessarily mean a lack of activity in the offensive play, while they have shown that they will stay true to their reputation in the pre-season friendlies. Liberec have strengthened their attacking line for this season and I think they are capable of scoring a goal or two against Trinec. While the home team win doesn't look like a bad choice, I'll pick this Over as it's a lot safer bet in my humble opinion, and, besides, it pays off a lot better than 1. Details