Danish Superliga, Matchday 1, Friday, 19.07.2024 at 20:00
After champions Midtjylland and Aarhus opened the new season of the Danish Superliga, the second match of the 2024/2025 season kicks off at 20:00. Aalborg will be looking to put down a marker against last year’s fourth-placed Nordsjaelland following their promotion.
The four-time Danish champions, who last lifted the championship trophy in 2014, played a round in League Two last season. The test matches have already been tough.
Not all the mechanisms are usually in place at the start of the season, and the preparation phase was also short. Will stability suffer as a result? In my Nordsjaelland Aalborg betting tip, I think both teams will score, the odds are provided by NEObet:
Five test matches, both teams scored five times. This is how the pre-season preparation went for Nordsjaelland and Aalborg. FC only tested twice after the season finale at the end of May. They won 3:2 against league rivals Randers.
The team also conceded two goals in a 2:1 defeat against Twente from the Netherlands. The club, which was just five points off a second league title, has now gone nine games without a clean sheet this season
The vulnerability in the test matches and at the end of last season is one reason for the still cautious odds on the favorites at home against promoted Aalborg. The sports betting apps of our bookmakers show 1.44 for the hosts.
Aalborg are in the 6.00 range, with 4.40 waiting for a bet on a draw in the second match of the first matchday. The summer break was not long. Less than two months lie between the last matchday of the 23/24 season and the start of the new
season.
The relegation puts Aalborg at a clear disadvantage in terms of squad quality. The much better-known players play for Nordsjaelland, whose squad is worth more than three times as many millions. However, the soccer club will sell the player with the highest market value in January.
Ex-Mainzer attacker Marcus Ingvartsen is moving to the future MLS team San Diego after just one and a half seasons in the States. Last season, he scored seven goals and provided two assists in 20 appearances. He scored his last goal against Copenhagen in April
Despite the slump, he is the top candidate to score for the bookmakers. Winamax serves up 2.15 for at least one goal, followed by Benjamin Nygren (2.35) and Conrad Harder (2.45). In the dress rehearsal against Twente, head coach Jens Olsen opted for a 4-2-3-1.
Ingvartsen moved to the back 10 position, with the 19-year-old Harder in front of him responsible for scoring goals. He was brought up last season and scored a total of two goals in 396 minutes.
This year, the team is hoping the homegrown player, who scored both goals in the championship playoff, will take the next step.
As already mentioned, Nordsjaelland have been waiting a long time for a match without conceding a goal, nine matches now. Given this number, I’m pessimistic that they’ll manage to keep a clean sheet this time.
Especially as teams at the start of the season still struggle with coordination and basic organization. And then there’s a motivated promoted team on the other side, which is difficult to analyze. After all, the four-time champions have many new players in their ranks.
There are four new names in attack alone, including the signing of Andres Jasson, a right winger from New York City FC.
At the same time, four players were brought up from the youth ranks. In goal for the first league comeback is Vincent Müller, who has 90 games of third league experience and most recently guarded the MSV Duisburg box.
He kept goal in all three test matches and failed to keep a clean sheet each time. A 1:1 draw against Hobro was followed by a 3:1 win against Odense, while the last match was a flop, a 1:4 defeat against Viborg
After relegation from the Superliga last season, things went better in Denmark’s second division, with the best defense and 48 goals scored in 22 games, they went straight back up to the top flight.
Although Sonderjysk overtook them in the promotion group, they finished 16 points ahead of third place, which would not have been enough to secure promotion. And Aalborg did not lose any of their eleven matches away from home during the regular season.
Nordsjaelland’s home record is also nothing to hide, however, with one defeat from eleven matches in the top flight
The last time the teams met was in the 2022/2023 Superliga. A clean sheet in Aalborg was followed by a 5-1 thumping for FC, but it was the only three-pointer against Aalborg in their last seven meetings.
Figures that do not necessarily speak in favor of a home win. Especially as a newly promoted team is always ready for a motivated top performance on the first matchday anyway. Aalborg have also now scored in six games in a row
Conclusion: The final phase of last season and Nordsjaelland’s preparations were not really convincing and then there is the record of nine games with at least one goal conceded, two in each of the two test matches.
Aalborg have many new faces in their squad, have scored in all three friendlies and have only lost one of their last seven games against Nordsjaelland. The hosts have the better team overall.
But that doesn’t mean much, especially at the start of the season, when the rhythm of the game isn’t there yet, the systems aren’t working perfectly and there’s a lack of stability here and there.
That’s why I’m going with the following tip: Both teams to score
