Besiktas vs Arsenal Preview

August 18, 2014
By: Deke Hardman

Arsene Wenger

Tuesday evening’s match at the Ataturk Olympic Stadium sees Besiktas host Arsenal in the first leg of their Champions League play-off.

Slaven Bilic’s side finished third in the Super Lig last season but made the qualifying rounds for the Champions League following champions Fenerbache’s exclusion from the competiton.

Their league campaign doesn’t begin until August 30th, though they beat Feyenord in both legs of the previous round of qualifiers, with Demba Ba netting a hat-trick in the 3-1 home win earlier this month.

Ba, who was heavily linked with a move to Arsenal last summer, is 9.5 (17/2) with 888 Sport to get the first goal of the game, with Cenk Tosun an 11.0 (10/1) shot with Ladbrokes.

The home win is generously priced at 6.5 (9/2) with a variety of firms, with the North London side favourites at 1.73 (8/11) with William Hill. The draw is widely available at 3.8 (14/5).

It is the seventh season in ten that the visitors have featured in the preliminary rounds of Europe’s to competition; nevertheless they have been involved in the group stages in each of the last sixteen campaigns.

They begin their league campaign with a 2-1 win over Crystal Palace on Saturday afternoon, having clinched a victory in the Community Shield against Premier League champions Manchester City at Wembley the previous weekend.

World Cup winning trio Per Metersacker, Mesut Ozil and Lukas Podolski are not set to return until the league match at Everton at the weekend, while Kieran Gibbs has joined David Ospina and Theo Walcott on the side-lines after picking up a muscle injury at the weekend.

Olivier Giroud is favourite to get the first goal of the game at 6.0 (5/1) with Coral, who price Chile international Alexis Sanchez at 6.5 (11/2).

Arsenal faced Turkish opposition in the Champions League in qualifying last season, beating Fenerbache by five goals to nil on aggregate.

Arsene Wenger’s side can be backed at 3.0 (2/1) with Ladbrokes to win the match without conceding, while a 2-0 victory for the Gunners is priced at 9.5 (17/2) with the same firm.

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