Las Palmas vs Real Sociedad prediction: SPAIN: LaLiga betting tips on match 2023-08-24 17:30.
With the La Liga (LL) season now two games old, both Las Palmas and Real Sociedad are still searching for their first victory. Las Palmas will hope a return home proves the perfect tonic for them to get off the mark this season, but having drawn six of their last seven home league games (L1), a match at the Gran Canaria Stadium may not prove the blessing it seems.
Interestingly, three of those six draws have seen Las Palmas score the opening goal before the half-hour mark, but killing the game off evidently remains an issue for them. Boss GarcĂa Pimienta admitted as much after their 1-0 defeat against Valencia last weekend too, insisting his side need to “generate more” in front of goal, but having drawn a scoring blank against Sociedad in three of the last four LL H2Hs hosted, this may not be an ideal fixture for Las Palmas to act upon their manager’s plea.
Sociedad hit the road for the first time in LL this season on the back of two season opening draws, and they’ve been plagued by a similar problem to that of Las Palmas, with both games seeing them give up the lead. In fact, both those games saw Imanol Alguacil’s side plunder a half-time lead, and the boss was highly critical of his side’s second half performance in their 1-1 draw with Celta Vigo last week, labelling it “not good at all”.
Improving upon that here may not be as cut-and-dry as their favourites tag suggests, as this isn’t a clash that’s served them particularly well down the years, proven by a LL away H2H record of W6, D8, L17. Now may prove an ideal time to change all that, as with the demands of Champions League football lurking around the corner, Sociedad will be keen to put points on the board as quickly as possible.
Players to watch: Jonathan Viera is the scorer of Las Palmas’ sole LL goal so far this campaign, and his last four strikes have been team openers from the penalty spot. He’ll be vying with Takefusa Kubo for the limelight, and he netted the game’s final goal with three of his four away league strikes last season.
Hot streak: The away side on the day has scored exactly once in Sociedad’s last four LL games.