I saw KAC in their last game in Jesenice and they look really awful. Only few chances and even those were saved by Jesenice goalkeeper Kristan. Their PP is joke, and they even get Shorthanded goal. They were even worse in their first game in Ljubljana. It is clear they are completly out of form. Maybe, the unexperienced coach Viveros is the reason....

On the other side, Linz. As far as I follow this league, they are one of the most unplesaned away teams. I saw them few times last year in Jesenice and they played hell of a hockey. They have very solid team. They lost in Graz in first round, a little surprise for me, but I think, they have nice chances(at least 50%) to win their game against KAC in Celovec.

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Two teams defetaed in first round, but too different stories.
I wrote about KAC in my analyse of Olimpija : VSV game.
They were very bad in Ljubljana. Extremly awaful PP, crapy goaltending, and everything you must not to do, if you want to win a hockey game.

On the other side due to reports Jesenice played a very solid game agains Vienna Capitals. They were trashed by their last year stars, Rodman brothers, who combined for three goals and set up another. But till the end it was 50-50 game, and the winner could easily be different than Capitals. Jesenice played bad in defence. They allowed 45 shots, and even such classy goalkeeper as Robert Kristan is, could not prevent the defeat. But KAC in this condition is right opponent to improve the defence play.

Anyway, I expekt both teams to go out with first win of the season in their minds. Due to form and home ground in "hell of Podmežakla" I give slide edge to Jesenice. Odds over @2.00 are execptable for lower/medium stake.

Although Olimpija has made a big surprise on Friday, beating KAC 6-2 I still do not trust them. They allowed many PP for KAC and only terrible KAC PP is reason, that first period was not won by KAC. KAC has two 5-3 PP situations but did not score. They played terrible, like some second division club. Also goaltender Verner was terrible.

Olimpija scored from their chances. Their goalie Alex Westlund also did his job. Olimpijas main problem is that they make too many penalites. Yestrday they survived, but tommorow...will be different story IMHO.

It is clear, that VSV is at the moment much better team than KAC. Yes, they lost 5-1 in Salzburg in first round, but not many teams will take points in Mozart city. I am pretty sure, that VSV will capitalize on PP chances much more easier than KAC did. I am confident, that they have better goalie than KAC(whoever will be in net, Prohaska or Starkebaum).
And I am sure they will play much tougher defence that KAC did.

And one more fact....odd is almost the same that it was against KAC. It is clear that VSV is better team than KAC, so I can not help my self not to going aganist Olimpija again, with little lower stakes than in last round,

IMHO a lot of people are overestimating Vienna Capitals before the new EBEL season. Yes, their new players are very, very solid. Fairchild, Rheaume, Rodman brothers, Fox, defenders Bjronlie and Casparsson and especially goalie Labbe are excellent. But names are not playin on the ice. Six players of each team do. And I am not sure if Gaudet will be able to compose good team out of these good individuals.
Vienna played solid in their preparation games, so they are favorites tonight against Jesenice, but for odds of @1,40...no kidding. Absolutley no Value, IMO.

Jesenice on the other side lost six best players from last season. Rodman brothers and Fox to Vienna and Kotyk, Pare and Razingar to Innsbruck. But they get an extraordinary good goalkeeper Robert Kristan form Brynas. He has seven shoot-outs in SEL last season and average of 90.9% SVS and 2.29 GAA Other players coming to Jesenice before this season were Markus Mathiasson, Paul Healy, Derek Bekar and Chris Bright. They are all very good players and I really do not see any reason Jesenice being such an underdog in this game....

+2 on Jesenice for me is way to high HC, so medium stake...

All, right. Let make one more bet against another newcomer.
Alba Volan will be played agains Innsbruck, 6th team form last
year EBEL. Innsbruck has made some storng aditions to their team. They signed three players form last year Jesenice team, Razingar, Pare and goalie Kotyk. Two great attackers, Craig Darby and Marco Pewal came from DEL and Salzburg.
Innsbruck signed also defneders Hohenberger from VSV, Helfer from Bolzano and Canadian Larocque. If new coach Pat Cortina will do his job, Innsbruck can be extraordinary strong.

Alba is newcomer and they are building their team slowly.
Their last addition to roster is Canadian Derek Gosselin. One of key players will also be hungarian number one goalie, Kristian Budai. Alba is playing for years some though defensive system. They will cause problems to many teams, spcially at home. However, I think Innsbruck will be too strong in first round.

Odd for 1.5 HC has fallen from @2.00. @1.83 is lowest acceptable price for me. Innsbruck win is payed with odds form @1.60 to @1.50. This is solid combo material. Lowest accetable price for me is @1.50....
GOOD LUCK!!!

New EBEL sesason will begin od Friday. There will be 10 teams playing in league this season. There will be two newcomers. Olimpija Ljubljana and Alba Volan form Hungary. In first round I will bet against both new teams.

First is game between Olimpija and KAC. Olimpija has built solid team with eight Canadian/USA players, with some very experienced Slovenian ex-international players and with some young solid Slovenian players. Their main weapon will be goalie Alex Westlund. Their coach is very unexperienced Russian Ildar Rahmatuljin(living in Slovenia for 15 years now). The main Olimpija problem at the moment is that they are not in good form yet, because team is completly new. Also coach has some language problems. Team did not play good in preseason.I saw two their games in preseason and they gained two many penalties. This will be their main problem at the begging of the league.

KAC IMHO will be nice suprise this season.Last two games they played against "my" Jesenice and they won game at home(7-3) and lost away(5-3). They acquierd some quailty
new players like Mike Craig(last year Vienna Capitals).Defenders Fuery and Tory are also good aditions to Celovec team. I think their main problems for highest places will be goaltending, because I do not have good opinon about Verner and Ezzenhofer.

But IMHO they are too strong at the moment for newcomers form Ljubljana. So, current price @2.35 is nice value for me. Personnaly, every odd higher than @2.00 is Value for me.

Ok, i will begin to publish some tenis picks also in my blog, cause hockey season is over now, and my main betting sport now is tennis.
Principles are same. Always looking for value. Most of my tenis picks are with odds form cca. 1.50 to 2.20...of course, when I think I see a Value in higher or lower odds outside this margine, i also play...But most of my picks are inside this margine...

So, there is a final in ATP tour in Hamburg and I am pretty confident, that Nadal will win this one in straight sets...

Why?
The main reasons is pretty poor form of Roger Federer currently.
He was choking during the whole torunament. Against poor Monaco, when he won in three long sets. He beat than Ferrero easily 2-0, but then he was choking against Ferrer and Moya, playing three sets in both cases...his game is in downtrend. No dout about it. To many Unforced errors and his play is not so dominant as it was before his two consecutive losses against Canas...

Nadal on the other hand has played good tournament with only bad moment yestrday, when he lost against in-form Hewit fiors set 6-2. All other games against Hernandez, Andreev and Gonzales was won without any problems in straight sets.

Last game between Nadal and Fedo was played in MC final, where Spaniard won easily 2-0...
IMHO, Nadal will win this one in straight sets....

Ok, we have second game between Ottawa in Pens tonight. I saw the first game and Ottawa was better in all aspects of the game. It is clear that young Pens guns have their legs shakend under the weight of playing their first play off game in career. They will be better tonight, no doubt about it. But Ottawa is much more experienced and they will do anything to get 2-0 lead today. Pens netminder Fleury was not at his best and he was replaced by Thibault. Odd is hot, I did not expekt something like that after first game and IMHO it is must taken.....

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First game finished exactly as it was predicted. Though defence with both goaltenders in key roles. It was Bryzgalov(today there will be probably Giguere on ice for Anaheim)for Anaheim and Backstrom for Minny. The game was all about one thing. Defnce, defence and again defence. I expekt something similar today. I belive, that best Minny attackers Gaborik and Demitra and Roloston will be sttoped by Pronger and Niedermayer and Anaheim attacks will be sttoped by extrtemly defensive tactics and great Bacstrom of Minnesota. The game will be decided IMO by some powerpaly goal and I expekt for goals at most only if one team will trash other very hard. But this is not something we can expekt due to form and h2h in season so far. Another scenario for over it could be fast goal and 1-1 finished first period...however, I belive that teams will be carefull, mainly waitnig for mistakes from oppponent.....

First game between Vancouver and Dallas will find place in history, no doubt about it....Henrik Sedin scored less than two minutes before the end end of the fourth OT period...

Vancouver gained momentum with such win IMHO. And gaining momenutm is one of the best things for the every team. Loungo was not at his best during regular time, but was excellent in OT. It was his first first play-off game ever and I expekt he will be in his best form today and that he will be a hughe boost for Vancouver....
Sedin twins were also excellent in OT and Kessler and Naslund with his leadership. I hope they will transform this momentum to next game....
Dallas was good, but it is not easy to recover after such heavy OT loss. Ribiero was good, and Marty Turco also showed one of his best play-off performances....
But I think, that Louongo and Sedin twins will be decesive fact in this series and I think Vancouver has nice chances to win this one tonight....
5 Units

Again, I see a little to high odd for this match. Atlanta and Rangers are not some extremly Under teams like Anaheim and Minnesota are. And I think that forwards are in both teams stronger parts of both team roosters. Rangers with attackers like Jagr, Straka, Nylander, Shanahan in Avery and by Atlanta IMHO even better Kovaljčuk, Hossa, Kozlov, Tkacuhk against preety solid Rangers defensman Mara, Rozsivalo, Tyutin and Malik and Atlanta¨s Zhitnik, Andy Sutton, Greg DeVries and Nicklas Havelid. It is clear that is possible that this game will go over 5.5 goals. Goaltenders are good both, but anyway, offerd odd is more than good. Teams played four times in regular season with two Overs and two unders. Small stake.....