Malaga remained in fourth place despite the unlucky defeat to Villarreal, and los Boquerones are now expected to return to the right track with a win over Real Sociedad. The Basque side failed to beat Betis at home and are now in for a difficult task at La Romareda.

Minor setback for Malaga

Malaga’s wealthy owners did a great job in the summer transfer window, having signed the likes of Ruud van Nistelrooy, Santi Cazorla, Isco, Jeremy Toulalan and Joaquin Sanchez, to name just a few, but the team experienced some problems in the first part of the season as boss Manuel Pellegrini needed some time to make his side gel. Once that happened, los Boquerones started climbing the La Liga standings, with the run of six wins in eight games helping them climb to fourth place in the standings. The good run came to an end in midweek as Malaga squandered a one-goal lead to lose at El Madrigal as the hosts scored two late goals to record a very important victory. Los Boquerones, nonetheless, remained in fourth place as Levante also lost their midweek fixture and Manuel Pellegrini’s side are now expected to have an easy job against Real Sociedad.

Keepers Wily Caballero and Carlos Kameni both miss out, meaning that Ruben will start between the sticks, while midfielder Duda is suspended.

Real Sociedad finally safe

Real Sociedad have been acting as genuine Jekyll and Hyde side, seeing they were unable to find any consistency and were usually unable to make two good results in a row. The run of three straight defeats threatened to hurt their survival chances, but Philippe Montanier’s side virtually ensured survival with an impressive 4-0 win over Rayo Vallecano, whereas back to back draws against Espanyol and Real Betis helped them create a 10-point advantage over the bottom three. Real Sociedad can now play without any pressure and they now travel to La Romareda hoping to continue the good run against Malaga, although stopping in-form los Boquerones will be no easy task. Their 3-3-10 away record in La Liga is certainly not good enough to enter this match high on confidence.

Imanol Agirretxe and Mikel Aranburu are both injury doubts, while Vadim Demidov is not yet ready to return.

Verdict

Malaga are on top of their game at the moment and los Boquerones are determined to make amends for the unlucky defeat to Villarreal. Real Sociedad have been playing well of late, but I seriously doubt they have enough quality to stop Malaga from winning this game.

Our prediction: Malaga with -1 Asian handicap

Odds: 1.83 (5/6)

Bookmaker: 188BET