MANCHESTER UNITED VS WOLFSBURG CHAMPIONS LEAGUE PREVIEW AND BETTING TIPS

Manchester United’s defensive woes have seen them rise in price dramatically on Betfair and they are trading at a whopping 3.8 to win tomorrow’s fixture against Wolfsburg to secure top spot in their Champions League Group.
Currently, you’ll find the German side trading at around 2.2 or so for the outright win with about $850,000 matched so far. The importance of the fixture has been ratcheted up as United would face a 50% chance of drawing giants Barcelona or Real Madrid were they to go through as runners-up. They are definitely looking to avoid that and a victory would see them play a much easier team. For the record, you can back a draw in this match at 3.45.
United are likely set to start with the most makeshift defence I’ve seen them deploy in my years following the side. Darren Fletcher and Michael Carrick look set to be named as the central defensive partnership and I’m actually quite interested to watch them take on the role. It could either be another Fergie masterstroke, or an embarrassment akin to Rio Ferdinand’s brief foray into central midfield.
United are a massive 4.4 to keep a clean sheet and with Wolfsburg forward Edin Dzeko considered a potential transfer target for United, he may be considering this fixture an audition for January. The favoured correct score call is 1-1 which is trading at just south of 8.0 at the moment. 1-0 to Wolfsburg pays out at 9.0 while United to sneak a 1-0 victory would pay at 13.5.
Dzeko is priced at 2.26 to score at anytime with Grafite also available at 2.5 or so. Obafemi Martins knows a thing or two about Manchester United and he is 3.2 to get on the scoresheet.
Darron Gibson is well-priced to continue his goalscoring exploits with a listing of 7.0 at the moment to score anytime. Danny Welbeck trades at 3.95 while Paul Scholes is 8.0 to score for the second game on the bounce. Carrick is 11.5 to score at anytime (a quality listing for somebody who may not see much attention from defenders). I expect more goalscorers to be added to the list as we get closer to match time.
Personally, I think United will pull this one off. They play well with their backs to the wall and when Fergie generally asks players to step up for the benefit of the rest of the team, they’ll do so. Additionally, an unmentioned aspect of the Carrick/Fletcher defensive pairing is that Carrick likely knows that he is viewed as a bit of a one-dimensional player, a good performance out of position in this match could see him curry more favour with Fergie. I also think that those two will be unmarked when they come forward, and they will come forward, so I think United will be especially dangerous from set-pieces.