Rayo Vallecano vs Valencia prediction: SPAIN: LaLiga betting tips on match 2023-12-18 18:00.
It was another miserable weekend for Rayo Vallecano, who now have a considerable distance to make up on the top six after their winless stretch was extended with a 1-0 defeat to Osasuna on Friday. The home side are now seven La Liga (LL) games without a victory (D4, L3), and whilst they could blame a difficult schedule that saw them pitted against top-six clubs in five consecutive games, their 0-0 draw with relegation battling Celta Vigo in their most recent home outing was inexcusable.
The inability to score freely has been a particular point of frustration for head coach Francisco RodrĂguez, who prior to their Osasuna defeat, pointed out that Vallecano were at the time the team with the third-highest average shots on goal per game across this LL season. Despite that, their home fans have not seen a LL victory since the middle of September (D5, L1), though the draw against Celta was the only one of the six in which they didn’t celebrate a goal.
Valencia remain level with Vallecano in the middle of the table on 20 points, making this a crucial clash in terms of heading into the new calendar year in the right direction. Their winless run in this competition now stands at five games (D2, L3), but there were no complaints from manager Rubén Baraja about the most recent one, when they held giants Barcelona to a 1-1 draw at home.
Baraja was especially pleased that they were able to claim an equaliser, as opposed to their preceding two LL games (both away from home) where they conceded beyond the 85th minute on each occasion to lose points. Valencia remain winless on the road in LL football since an opening round win at Sevilla (D3, L5), failing to score against similarly placed clubs such as Real Betis (L 3-0), Getafe (L 1-0) and Alavés (L 1-0).
Players to watch: Isi Palazón’s last goal was in Vallecano’s most recent home win, but he could be inspired by his two goals against Valencia across the last two seasons. For the visitors, Valencia’s last three LL away goals all came from Hugo Duro after half-time.
Hot streak: The last 12 LL H2Hs were all won or drawn by the home side of the day (W6, D6).