The first of the Copa America quarter-final ties features Peru taking on Paraguay at the Estádio Olímpico Pedro Ludovico Teixeira in a match between two teams that have experienced contrasting fortunes in recent times.
Following a 4-0 mauling at the hands of host nation and favourites, Brazil, in their opening match in Group B, Peru have staged a promising recovery by picking up important wins against Colombia 2-1 and Venezuela 1-0 along with holding Ecuador to a 2-2 draw to finish runners-up behind the Group B winners, Brazil.
Having also registered a 2-1 win over Ecuador in their recent World Cup qualifier as well, Peru look to be building some impressive momentum heading into the knockout rounds of this year’s Copa America.
Midfielder, Carillo (2 goals), leads the way in goalscoring terms for Peru but the likes of forward Lapadula, is also a dangerous attacking threat in the final third as he showed in Serie A for Benevento this season.
Peru manager, Ricardo Gareca, has no injury worries ahead of this vital quarter-final tie and is expected to field the same eleven that secured the important 1-0 victory over Venezuela in their final match of the group stage.
By contrast, Paraguay have produced mixed returns to date in this Copa America tournament as they’ve recorded wins against Bolivia 3-1 and a 2-0 victory over Chile but have also fallen to losses against Argentina and Uruguay as well.
The prospects of a Paraguay win here seem slim at best as they’ve managed to pick up just five wins out of their last 20 matches in all competitions, while in the Copa America, Paraguay have won just two of their last 13 games.
This poor sequence of previous results also include eight defeats and along with their poor head-to-head record against Peru in previous meetings.
It looks like Paraguay may have their work cut out in order to match the growing confidence of Peru here.
Paraguay are expected to be without forward Bareiro, who is suffering from a knee injury and looks likely to miss his side’s quarter-final clash with Peru, so they’ll be hoping that leading goalscorer, Romero, can fire them to the semi’s.
Peru are unbeaten in each of their previous seven meetings against Paraguay and they look the more likely to progress through to the semi-finals than their Saturday’s opponents.
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