Benfica vs RB Salzburg Odds
| Benfica Odds | -225 |
| RB Salzburg Odds | +700 |
| Draw | +340 |
| Over / Under | 2.5 -175 / +137 |
Benfica have qualified for the quarterfinals in consecutive seasons of the Champions League, which is a massive achievement for Roger Schmidt's side. The Portuguese champions lost their top striker Gonçalo Ramos to PSG in the offseason and are now further removed from the departure of Enzo Fernandez to Chelsea. Schmidt's side has replenished its midfield to replace Fernandez, but questions remain about the quality of their attack headed into their opening match against RB Salzburg on Wednesday.
Salzburg advanced out of the group stage two years ago and had comparable underlying numbers to Milan in last year's group stage, but the Austrian side finished third in its group. They too have lost a lot of key talent from the squad, but it's always a good bet to rely on the scouting and talent development of this young squad.
Here's how I'm betting Benfica vs RB Salzburg in the Champions League.
Benfica
Benfica entered the group of death last season alongside PSG and Juventus and had odds as long as +350 to advance. The market was sleeping on the underlying quality of this Benfica side at the time. They did the double over Juventus and drew twice with PSG en route to winning that group on the final day. In hindsight, given how overrated PSG and Juventus were, winning that group proved to be less impressive than originally thought.
They followed up an excellent group stage with a dominant two leg victory against Club Brugge, who later proved to be the weakest team in the final 16. Inter outplayed them relatively comfortably in the quarterfinal. The back-to-back quarterfinals have Benfica as the clear second place team based on pricing in this group, but they have showed some defensive cracks in Portugal already.
Through five matches in Portugal, they have conceded at least 1.1 xGA in four of those contests. Schmidt's system is quite aggressive and the defense hasn't been at normal Benfica levels at this point. When you compare this to last year, it's significant defensive regression.
The attack is still scoring goals for fun in Portugal, but it will not be easy to replace Ramos' 21 goal contributions and Alex Grimaldo's 14 goal contributions from left back this year. Arthur Cabral was brought in from Fiorentina to come off the bench and complement Petar Musa as the expected lone striker up top. Musa has put up good underlying numbers in his limited minutes at Benfica, but there is a clear drop-off in production from Ramos.
Angel Di Maria has five goals and two assists in his first six appearances with the club, but the frenetic pressing energy of Salzburg could make life difficult for him in this matchup.
RB Salzburg
If you just look at the transfer activity of Salzburg this summer, it would be easy to be concerned about their goal-scoring abilities. They sold Noah Okafor to Milan, Benjamin Sesko to RB Leipzig and Junior Adamu to Freiburg. The Austrian side also has a new goalkeeper since Phillip Kohn was sold to Monaco.
That's a lot of goals to replace, but the early returns from their youngsters suggest that the Salzburg scouting department may have found some new real breakout talents to replace them. We certainly don't know exactly what this Salzburg team is because of all of the turnover, but 19-year-old forward Karim Konate has six goals and two assists in eight matches. 20-year-old forward Roko Simic also has shown real promise in his minutes thus far for the club.
Salzburg may have come in third behind Chelsea and Milan in a difficult group last year, but the six matches didn't suggest they were overmatched. They finished with a slightly negative goal differential in the four matches home and away against Milan and Chelsea. In the Europa League, Salzburg were outplayed over two legs by Roma but weren't uncompetitive.
Benfica vs RB Salzburg
Pick & Prediction
From a buy low and sell high perspective, Benfica are a team I'm looking to bet against given the talent departure and concerning underlying numbers defensively to begin the season. Benfica and Salzburg are both aggressive pressing teams that try to win the ball back, which should create a relatively open contest.
There's a chance Salzburg are much worse than we think after losing their forward talent, but the Austrian side has been competitive with second tier European sides and should be closer to +1 in the match. I'd bet Salzburg +1.25 or better at -120 or better.
