Western United vs Adelaide United Prediction: Goals likely with Reds in last chance saloon

Adelaide United's top-six hopes took a huge hit last Friday as they threw away a 1-0 lead at home to Macarthur FC to lose 2-1. That result means anything but a win in their game in hand on Tuesday, against Western United at the Wyndham Regional Football Facility, will likely spell the end for their finals dreams.

Below you can find all the latest team news and match odds ahead of this TNT Sports 1 televised clash, which kicks off at 10:00, and see our Western United vs Adelaide United predictions.

Western United head into this one off the back of a 2-0 home defeat to top-of-the-table Central Coast Mariners on Saturday. John Aloisi's side held on for the first 50 minutes before Max Balard broke their brave resistance, and Christian Theoharous came off the bench to make sure of the points in the latter stages.

Tuesday's hosts are still in 11th, though, after Perth Glory were demolished 8-0 by Melbourne City a day later. The two clubs are level on 22 points at the bottom but Western United are above courtesy of an extra victory to their name.

Adelaide United, meanwhile, are six points behind sixth-placed Western Sydney Wanderers, who currently occupy the final play-off spot for the A-League Men's finals. The Reds would go above Brisbane Roar and two points behind seventh-placed Melbourne City with a win on Tuesday, but there will be just two matches left for them to overtake City and WSW.

Team News

Western United will welcome Tomoki Imai back into the fold after the Japanese defender completed his two-game ban on Saturday. 19-year-old Kane Vidmar is likely to make way for the 33-year-old at the heart of the defence.

Jacob Tratt, Noah Botic, Rhys Bozinovski and Ramy Najjarine remain injured for the hosts.

The visitors have three players out injured themselves in Jay Barnett, Joshua Cavallo and Panagiotis Kikianis.

Match Odds

There's nothing to separate these sides in the betting on Tuesday, with both handed odds of 7/5 to secure the three points, giving each an implied win probability of 41.7%.

The draw is available at 11/4, both teams to score at 1/3 and over 3.5 goals at 5/6.

Over 4.5 goals @ 2/1

After Adelaide's late disintegration against Macarthur FC, I'm not sure I can totally back the Reds to recover and secure the win they need to give themselves a fighting chance to finish in the top six.

That's why I'm more inclined to suggest goals in this fixture, with little to lose for either side. The visitors need to go on the attack to secure all three points while the hosts are looking to move away from Perth Glory at the bottom and avoid the dreaded wooden spoon.

Games involving Adelaide United do tend to produce goals - only Perth Glory (four) see more goals per game than the Reds (3.75) this season, and 33% of their 24 league games have had the over 4.5 bet land.

Western United's average for the campaign is 3.21 goals per game and 21% of theirs have finished with at least five scored.

Over 4.5 goals was a winner in the last meeting between the sides, a 4-1 win for Adelaide United at Coopers Stadium on March 29, and three of the last five head-to-heads have produced at least five goals.

Nestory Irankunda to score anytime @ 8/5

We were a whisker away from landing a 15/2 selection on Irankunda to score at least twice in last week's match with Macarthur FC. It only took him 20 minutes to open the scoring in Adelaide and he was given the chance to bag a brace from the penalty spot in the dying stages, but the 18-year-old fluffed his lines to ruin his Coopers Stadium goodbye.

Nevertheless, I'm backing this precociously talented teenager to overcome that setback and score for a fifth time in his last four games. The start of this run saw Irankunda net a hat-trick against Tuesday's opponents with all three goals arriving before the 50th minute.

The Bayern Munich-bound attacker will be going all out to right the wrongs of last week and that should inspire him to scored an eighth A-League Men's goal of the campaign against a side that has conceded at least twice in its last four games.

Check out the rest of our Football Betting Tips here.