The New Coach effect

Massive game for Deportivo, bottom of the table three points from safety with three of their next four, including the next two away from their beautifully situated home stadium. New home coach Domingos José Paciência will be looking to impress right from the start and will have the home troops well and truly fired up for this.

On the pitch it is hard to know how things could have gone any better for the visitors in 2012 and they ended the year with a 3-2 defeat of Real Madrid, but their well documented off the field problems seem sure to catch up with them eventually and in the meantime, it is true that domestically they have struggled a little on the road, where they play on the counter and show little of the offensive swagger we see at the La Rosaleda stadium. They sit back and try to hit teams on the break, a tactic which has worked wonderfully well in the Champions League, but less so in La Liga where their eight away games have only produced eight goals and they have ridden their luck in posting three wins.

No real problems for either side, Malaga have several fringe and long term injuries, of which biggest name is defensive midfielder Jeremy Toulalan (7-0-0), he has not featured much this season, but it is worth noting that he played in two of the road wins and also in noteworthy away points in Milan and Zenit and they look more solid when he is giving the backline protection.

I do not think the visitors will have much to feed off today, we will not see Depor being too gung ho, that is not Paciência's style at all and he has been preaching two things to his players all week, "concentration and hard work". I have to take something on what is sure to be a fired up host and very nice odds with the draw no bet option.

1.25 units Deportivo level ball 2.29 asian line

Deportivo : Aranzubia, Manuel Pablo, Evaldo, Alex, Ze Castro, Aythami, André Santos, Pizzi, Juan Domínguez, Riki, Lux, Abel Aguilar, Bruno Gama, Camuñas, Valerón, Salomao, Marchena and Nelson Oliveira.

Malaga: Kameni, Jesús Gámez, Weligton, Demichelis, Camacho, Joaquín. Saviola, Seba, Willy, Monreal, Iturra, Duda, Eliseu, Portillo, Buonanotte, Sergio Sánchez, Isco, Santa Cruz and Fabrice.