Croatia v Brazil Betting Tips [9 December 2022]

Croatia take on the favorites Brazil bidding to reach the World Cup semi-finals for the second successive tournament.  This game is being played at the Education City Stadium in Al Rayyan on Friday. Croatia drew 1-1 in 120 minutes and ended up winning the match 3-1 on penalties. Unlike Brazil, Croatia remain unbeaten in the 2022 World Cup, though three of their four matches at the competition have ended in draws. While proving to be tough to crack, Croatia haven’t also been scoring as much as expected, given the caliber of players in their squad. With the exception of their 4-1 win over Canada at the group stage, Croatia haven’t scored more than a goal in a game. This, and the fact that they have kept two clean sheets in the four matches, has seen three of their four matches at this tournament end in under 2.5 goals. Croatia should have all their players available for this game; Josip Stamisic, who missed the Japan game with a muscular injury should be in good shape for this game though he may not be a starter. Borna Sosa was also ruled out of the Japan game with a virus but all that has cleared now and he will be available to start.

Brazil on their part, are coming from an easy win over South Korea; they beat the Asian giants 4-1 in their round of 16 clash, with all their goals coming in the opening half. The goal conceded though, means they have not kept a clean sheet in their last two games, and the earlier 1-0 loss to Cameroon remains their only defeat in this competition, though they did leave out several key players for that match against the Afican nation. That defeat is their only loss in 19 matches. They have two more wins than Croatia in this competition, but scored more than a goal in half of their matches here. Three of their four matches here have produced under 2.5 goals and this has been largely due to their game management, where they only target to score and place themselves in a comfortable position. While they are favorites going into this game, Brazil will be without a few key players – Gabriel Jesus and Alex Telles have been ruled out of the remainder of this competition, while Alex Sandro will be subject to further tests to see his ability to feature here. Neymar returned, and scored in the win over South Korea, and should be fit enough to start again here.

A tight game is expected when Brazil and Croatia face off; these two sides have been in low scoring games, both keeping two clean sheets in this competition and three of their last four matches each producing less than three goals. Being a knockout game, we will not expect either side to go all out and thus we will stick with under 2.5 goals as our prediction.

If you want more information and predictions, check out the Croatia v Brazil prediction and betting tips at Sportytrader.