Hearts – Viktoria Plzen

The Scottish club will not be able to rehabilitate for the defeat in the Czech Republic

One of the top three teams in the Czech Republic had a tough time getting a home win in the Europa League play-off round. Viktoria Plzeň had a lacklustre start against Hearts at home a week ago. Having taken matters into their own hands in the second half of their home game with Hearts, the Czech side were faced with settled opponents who defended confidently and, without really escalating the game in attack kept the match close to a zero draw. However, the class of Viktoria Plzen's players still showed before the final whistle. Active actions of the Czech team in attack on 90+6 minutes led to Oyegoke's auto-goal and a 0:1 defeat for Hearts. Bookmakers have identified the guests as favourites for the upcoming meeting, offering odds of 2.05 on their victory. Hearts became the third on the results of the last football season in Scotland. The beginning of the current season came out for the team nightmarish. In the asset Hearts in five official matches of the current football year can be recorded only a home draw with Rangers. The next four matches were lost by the team. In the League Cup, Hearts suffered from Falkirk, representing the second division of Scotland, and in the Premier League lost two away matches with the same score of 1-3. The opponents were Motherwell and Dundee. Of course, we can believe in a miraculous transformation of Hearts in the upcoming game, but the team needs to win, which means attacking and giving space to the opponent's more classy players. Viktoria Plzen has the opposite opponent statistics of the new season. In the Europa League qualification, the Czech club has already passed one round, during which they beat Ukrainian Kryvbas twice (2:1 and 1:0). In the championship, Viktoria Plzen has lost points only once in five rounds, when it failed to take three points from an away match against Jablonec in the first match of August. The rest of the opponents the team beat quite confidently. Before the return match, the Czechs have a psychological advantage. A week ago, Victoria struck a victorious blow to the opponent when he had already resigned himself to a favourable draw. Losing now to all opponents, Harts' team is unlikely to have such a serious psychological reserve to win in such conditions.