River hosts bottom-of-the-table Estudiantes Río Cuarto with 71% favored by the model

River Plate hosts Estudiantes Río Cuarto at the Monumental with the urgency of a team sitting tenth in group B and needing points to climb out of the middle of the table. Across the field will be the group's last-place side, with just 6 points from 11 matches, in one of those matchups where the form chart points one way, though soccer always leaves the door open.

Leonardo Ponzio's team arrives with a record of 4 wins, 1 draw and 5 losses in 10 matches this tournament, with 13 goals scored and 12 allowed. Over its last five games it picked up three wins, a draw and a loss, a stretch with more victories than defeats that still wasn't enough to move up the standings. In this season's Argentine Primera División, playing at home, River averages 1.76 goals scored and 1 allowed per match across a sample of 8 games, with 38% of those matches ending in a clean sheet and the 31st to 45th minute window as its most productive stretch. Sebastián Driussi and Gonzalo Montiel lead the scoring in that sample, with 4 goals each.

Estudiantes Río Cuarto, coached by Rubén Forestello, is going through a far tougher stretch: 1 win, 3 draws and 7 losses in 11 matches, with just 6 goals scored against 15 allowed. Recent form hasn't helped either, with a draw and four losses in the last five. As a visitor in this season's Primera División, across 8 matches, the team averages just 0.12 goals scored per game and allows 1.76, with only 13% of matches ending in a clean sheet. That's a tough trend to reverse at a ground like the Monumental.

The head-to-head record offers little encouragement for the visitors either: in the 2 meetings on record, River won both, with a combined score of 4 goals for and 0 against.

Probable lineups

For River, the projected lineup (rated high reliability based on recent starting frequency) would have Santiago Beltrán in goal, a back line with Nicolás Otamendi, Lucas Martínez Quarta, Marcos Acuña and Gonzalo Montiel, a midfield with Ángel Correa, Tobías Andrada, Thiago Almada, Tomás Galván and Fausto Vera, and Sebastián Driussi leading the attack.

For Estudiantes Río Cuarto, with medium reliability on the projection, the side would likely line up with Lucas Bruera between the posts, a back four of Matías Valenti, Gonzalo Maffini, Fernando Rodríguez and Gonzalo González, a midfield of Juan Antonini, Gabriel Alanís, Alejandro Cabrera and Tomás González, and Ibrahim Hesar paired with Mauro Valiente up front.

What the numbers say

Our model shows a clear edge for the home side, though it doesn't close the book on the match entirely:

This is our own estimate, not a betting line, and the expected goals figures back it up: 1.82 for River against 0.41 for the visitors, for a total of 2.24. The season's trends add some nuance: just a 38% chance of the match going over 2.5 total goals and only a 9% chance of both teams scoring, which points more toward a comfortable win than a blowout.

With the 7-point gap currently separating the two sides in the standings and recent history favoring the Monumental, River has a clear chance to move closer to the upper half of group B. For Estudiantes Río Cuarto, the challenge is simply to snap a slump that has left it as the division's worst-scoring team on the road.