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Steffen Schmidt - July 10, 2023
Astana vs Dinamo Tbilisi
UEFA Champions League Qualification
Date: 12 July 2023, Wednesday
Kick-off at 15:00 UK / 16:00 CET
Venue: Astana Arena (Astana).
Astana host Dinamo Tbilisi in the first leg of the UEFA Champions League first qualifying round on Wednesday evening at Astana Arena.
Both teams are looking to bounce back from poor continental campaigns in recent years. Dinamo Tbilisi have a much richer history but Astana have been much more successful in the last decade.
Astana have played the group stage of either Champions League (once) or Europa League (four times) in five consecutive years, but their previous appearance in the groups came back in the 2019/20 season.
Astana have been struggling both domestically and in Europe in the last three years, suffering unexpected eliminations in the early stages of the qualifying processes to the likes of Dynamo Brest, Buducnost Podgorica, KuPS, and Rakow.
They have won the Kazakh Premier League finally after a three-year break and they are the current leaders in the new season of the domestic top flight with 12 wins and just 2 losses in 16 opening outings.
Dinamo Tbilisi have won the Georgian elite class three times in the last four years. They are, however, only fourth in the domestic league standings after 19 rounds of the new season.
It is worth noting that Giorgi Tchiabrishvili’s men play attractive football this season with a goal difference of 44-28 in 19 matches in the domestic league.
They boast the best attacking record in the Georgian Erovnuli Liga but the fact they shipped 28 goals in 19 league fixtures does not bode well ahead of tough European ties.
Dinamo Tbilisi suffered an embarrassing elimination to Estonian side Paide at the start of their UEFA Conference League qualifications last year, losing 5-6 on aggregate on the occasion.
Astana have had much better results in Europe in the last decade. They seem significantly stronger than in the last three or four years and we do not expect the Kazakh outfit to have any problems in this double-header.
The hosts are certainly big favorites for us in the first leg and we will back Astana to win as the main pick at the odds of 1.83. You can alternatively back the hosts to net two or more goals on Wednesday at the 2.00 odds.
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