Serbia vs. Switzerland Betting Tips: Side with Mitrovic to be carded

The Group stages come to a close at the World Cup in Qatar on Friday evening with Serbia facing Switzerland in Group G. Our man Anthony Eadson is on hand to provide us with his best bets for the match.

Serbia were beaten by Brazil in their Group G opener before featuring in one of the games of the tournament so far when playing out a 3-3 thriller with Cameroon. That leaves the Eagles with just one point on the board heading into Friday and they know they must collect three points here if they are to stand any chance of qualifying for the knockout stages

Switzerland on the other hand are in a much better position to qualify for the latter stages, mostly due to a 1-0 win over Cameroon in their first match thanks to a Breel Embolo strike. That remains Switzerland's only goal of the tournament so far with Murat Yakin’s side losing 1-0 to Brazil, but the bookmakers still fancy them to reach the last-16 with bet365 going 1/2 that they do so. 

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A win here for the Swiss would guarantee qualification, although they may still be without the services of Noah Okafor who missed the game against Brazil and may need to be assessed before kick-off. Xherdan Shaqiri also missed that game with the Selecao but should be fit enough to start here if called upon.

Taking a look at the match odds for this game and the bookmakers are expecting a tight contest with Serbia the marginal favourites at 13/8. Switzerland can be backed at 9/5 to take all three points, while the draw is on show at 9/4.

The first pick we are touting on Friday comes courtesy of Unibet where we are backing Under 3.5 goals in the game and for Switzerland’s Ricardo Rodriguez to commit Over 0.5 fouls. For customers who do not have a Unibet account they currently have a sign-up offer where you can receive money back as a bonus up to £40 if your first bet loses.

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There is little to separate these two teams and a tight contest would be no surprise. Switzerland are notorious for keeping things tight and should be able to soak up much of the pressure against Serbia, just as they did against Brazil. There have been under 2.5 goals in their last three World Cup matches.

No player for the Swiss has committed more fouls this tournament than left-back Ricardo Rodriguez, with five in total. The 30-year-old, who plays his club football in Italy with Torino, will be the direct opponent of Serbia’s Sergej Milinkovic-Savic who is the Eagles’ most fouled player so far at the tournament (4). With this in mind and the magnitude of this game for Switzerland it would be no surprise to see Rodriguez rack up a few fouls.

Again with Unibet, we’ve combined two selections via their Bet Builder feature for our second bet for the game, in the form of Aleksandar Mitrovic to register Over 0.5 shots on target and be carded. 

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Against Cameroon Mitrovic opened his account at the World Cup in a game where he let off seven shots in total, two of which hit the target. The Serbian has been in excellent form for Fulham over the last few years and already has nine Premier League goals in just 12 appearances this term. Serbia must win here and it would be no surprise to see Mitro leading the charge, testing Yann Sommer in the Swiss goal on all possible occasions. 

Aleksandar Mitrovic has also had a colourful disciplinary record over the years and with what’s on the line here it would be no surprise to see him in the thick of it once again. Mitrovic was booked four times in nine matches for Serbia across their last two Nations League campaigns and with four in 12 in the Premier League this year he looks a prime suspect to find his way into the book against Switzerland.