Celtic vs Bayern prediction: Bayern to cruise past Celtic in Champions League first leg clash | OneFootball

Celtic welcome Bayern Munich to Celtic Park in the first leg of their Champions League play-off knowing that they will need to use their home advantage if they are to give themselves a realistic chance of making it through to the knockout stages (kick-off 8pm, live on TNT Sports and Discovery+ app).

The Bhoys qualified for the play-off in 21st place in the league, three points and nine places below Wednesday’s opponents.

They won three matches against Slovan Bratislava, RB Leipzig and Young Boys and picked up draws against Atalanta, Club Brugge and Dinamo Zagreb. But, they endured two heavy defeats though, going down 7-1 away in Borussia Dortmund and 4-2 at Aston Villa last time out.

Bayern missed out on automatic qualification by a single point, after winning five and losing three of their eight games.

They opened their campaign with a 9-2 thrashing of Dinamo Zagreb but defeats against Aston Villa and Barcelona followed to leave them way off the pace.

They also managed wins over Benfica, Paris St-Germain, Shakhtar and Slovan Bratislava but a 3-0 defeat away at Feyenoord means they have to play two more games to reach the last 16.

The six-time European champions have reached the quarter-finals or better in 12 of their last 13 Champions League campaigns, the exception being a last-16 elimination by Liverpool in 2018/19.

Football betting sites have Bayern as fourth favourites to lift the trophy in May, at 8/1, behind Liverpool, Barcelona and Arsenal, while Celtic are 400/1.

Celtic have impressed at home this season and are unbeaten at Parkhead in all competitions, but they face a huge step up in quality on Wednesday.

Despite both sides sitting top of their respective leagues, it’s hard to see how Brendan Rodgers’ side can overcome the German giants, especially over two legs.

In a one-off game, anything can happen but over two legs the best side usually comes out on top and just based on their previous Champions League results there seems to be a big gulf in quality.

Celtic drew 0-0 with Zagreb, while Bayern beat them 9-2 and they were beaten 7-1 by Borussia Dortmund who are 11th in the Bundesliga, 25 points behind Munich.

Betting sites have the German side favourite to win in Glasgow at odds of 5/12 while you can get 7/1 on a Celtic win and 9/2 on a draw.

Harry Kane and Jamal Musiala have already scored 43 goals between them in all competitions this season, including eight in the Champions League. Add to that the four scored by former Crystal Palace midfielder Michael Olise and you are just one short of the number Celtic scored in their eight games so far.

In the SPL though they have netted 73 times in 25 games, and conceded just 12, and they scored in six of their eight European games so they will fancy their chances of keeping up their scoring form.

This is the fifth time the two sides have met, and Celtic are yet to secure a victory, with one draw and three defeats so far.

They drew their first match 0-0 in October 2017 but lost 2-1 last time around with goals from Kingsley Coman and Javi Martinez securing the win.

As much as I would love to see a shock, I think Bayern will have one foot in the last 16 after the first leg. They slipped up at Villa earlier in the season but their run of 10 wins from their last 12 games shows just how dominant they can be.

You have to get quite creative when it comes to other options with the Bayern players dominating the scoring odds.

Kane is an easy one to pick, after all, as England captain he is likely to get a lot of stick from the Scottish crowd.

He also has 28 goals in 28 games so far this season and six goals in his last four matches, so he is in a pretty rich vein of form.

He’s bagged braces in the last two matches against Holstein Kiel and Werder Bremen and I’m backing him to do the same again.

Betting apps are offering just 3/1 on him scoring first or 4/6 at any time, or you can get 14/1 on him bagging a hat-trick, something he has achieved four times already this season.

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