Red Star Belgrade and Pyunik Yerevan will meet in the first leg of their Champions League qualifiers with the winner set to take a giant leap into next season’s competition down at the Rajko Mitic Stadium.
We are already four games into the Serbian SuperLiga for this season and things have gone just as they usually do with Red Star flying out the blocks and taking everybody by storm.
❗️3.8. - Ponesi dres❗️Zvezdaši, hajde da obojimo Marakanu u crveno-belo! Pozivamo vas da na utakmicu sa Pjunikom dođete u Zvezdinom dresu kako bismo napravili spektakularnu koreografiju! ⚽️ Crvena zvezda - Pjunik⏳ Sreda, 3. avgust od 20:45🏟 Stadion “Rajko Mitić” pic.twitter.com/by55KROIVg— FK Crvena zvezda (@crvenazvezdafk) August 1, 2022
❗️3.8. - Ponesi dres❗️Zvezdaši, hajde da obojimo Marakanu u crveno-belo! Pozivamo vas da na utakmicu sa Pjunikom dođete u Zvezdinom dresu kako bismo napravili spektakularnu koreografiju! ⚽️ Crvena zvezda - Pjunik⏳ Sreda, 3. avgust od 20:45🏟 Stadion “Rajko Mitić” pic.twitter.com/by55KROIVg
After the first four fixtures, the club have claimed all 12 points and looked practically unstoppable in every minute with a sensational 17 goals scored and just one gone in.
Incredibly, their goals conceded record is not as impressive as Vojvodina's 0 to this stage in the league season, but with 17 goals scored, they've almost tripled every other sides’ goals scored.
Red Star kicked things off with an easy 4-0 victory over Radnicki Nis and then a 5-0 thrashing of Kolubara where Milan Pavkov scored three times over the two games, just as Aleksandar Katai netted twice as well.
Mladost Lucani were up next for the Serbian giants, and it was a much tighter match as they conceded their only goal when Nikola Lekovic scored.
It was Pavkov once again for Red Star that changed the game with his fourth of the season already, as Stefan Mitrovic scored the decisive second.
Last time out, the club then thrashed Radnik Surdulica 6-0 as they returned back to their goalscoring and defensive best with a flawless display at home.
Now, against Pyunik not expected to threaten them that much, it could be another easy ride for Red Star in this first leg Champions League third round qualifier.
Pyunik are one game down in their Armenian league that only contains 10 teams and they sit with 0 points after losing their first game 1-0 to Ararat.
This is also the furthest the club has got to qualifying for the Champions League, and their poor form in that clash doesn’t bode well for the huge hopes circling around the club for a place on the biggest stage in Europe.
They did, however, manage to ease past Diddeleng in the last qualifying round where despite losing the first leg at home 1-0, they came back to thrash them 4-1 in an excellent attacking display.
It doesn’t look like this will be enough to get them through over two legs, and Red Star should set themselves up nicely for a comfortable second leg with a win here. Forebet predicts them to win and for the game to see over 2.5 goals.