All you need to know before Scottish Cup Final between Celtic and Hearts
Kick-off: 25th May 2019 at 16:00 (Pretoria time, GMT+2)
Stadium: Hampden Park (Glasgow)
It is nice to be a Celtic’s fan as they are one of the teams that have dominated domestic competitions for years in Scotland. If they manage to win this game, they will get their third consecutive treble, as they already managed to win the Premiership and League Cup this season. There are not many football experts that think Celtic will fail in this game, but nevertheless, they need to be careful. While they’ve somehow made it, Hearts has been in terrible form for the past two months.
This season Celtic had an easy task in the FA Cup, as they won all four games without conceding a single goal. In the first game of the FA Cup competition they won 3-0 against Airdrieonians at home in the 4th round, then again at home, they managed to beat St. Johnstone 5-0 in the 5th round, in the quarterfinals they won against Hibernian away from home 2-0, and in semis, they managed to coast past Aberdeen 3-0. So they won all four games, and during that process, they scored 13 goals and managed to keep a clean sheet in all four games. Overall, Celtic had an excellent season as they lost only five domestic games overall.
On the other hand Hearts had a much harder path to the finals. They won in the 4th round against Livingston 1-0 easy enough, and in the 5th round they had an easy task against low league team Auchinleck Talbot, but in the quarterfinals it got a little bit more difficult as Hearts needed to play replay against Partick Thistle as they only managed to draw in the first game. In the semifinals, they won against Inverness CT and qualified to the finals. Their road to the Finals was rather easy, as they played against only one Premiership team (Livingston). Despite that they started excellently and were on the top of the Premiership table after seven rounds, Hearts had a mediocre season. They are in bad form at the moment, with only one win in past seven games. Obviously, with that form BetXChange sportsbook rate them as an underdog in this Cup Final and the odds on their win are 8.77 at the moment.
Team News
Celtic manager, Neil Lennon, has no problems with injured or suspended players in this game and he will be able to put on the field the best possible players on Saturday. His opponent on the Hearts bench, Craig Levein, to the contrary has some doubts about the fitness of his players. According to the latest news, Hearts’ team has no less than three injured players, and their succesful participation in the Cup Final is highly doubtful at best. Experienced midfielder Arnoud Djoum, forward Uche Ikpeazu, and Austrian defender Peter Haring all have injury concerns. All of them started to train, but it is a big question whether they will be fit for the big game on Saturday.
H2H and Game Trends
These two teams have played each other five times this season, with Celtic managing to win four of those games, while Hearts won just one – the first game of the season in August. An interesting trend in this fixture is that in the last ten games these two teams have played eacdhother, eight times the games have ended with Over 2.5 goals, and five of these ten games saw both teams scoring.
Knowing the playing style of both teams, we can assume that this game will be engaging with a couple of goals in the net at least. Over 2.5 is the smart bet here.
Betting Prediction
Celtic has been the dominant side in Scotland for years now and will by all likelyhood carry that domination onto the field here. Despite Hearts having had an excellent start to their season, their current form solidifies them as the major underdog going into this game. There might not be enough juice in the outrights, that’s why we’d suggest you take a look at the goals market, where you can find some interesting odds.
