Both managers are still unbeaten since taking over within the last 12 months, and despite Venezuela's struggles in qualifying in recent years, we expect to see a competitive match on Thursday.
However, Colombia clearly possess greater individual quality, with Diaz in particular capable of making the difference after scoring twice in four Premier League starts for Liverpool already this season.
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Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Colombia win with a probability of 61.9%. A draw had a probability of 24.4% and a win for Venezuela had a probability of 13.65%.
The most likely scoreline for a Colombia win was 1-0 with a probability of 17.63%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 2-0 (14.18%) and 2-1 (8.54%). The likeliest drawn scoreline was 0-0 (10.96%), while for a Venezuela win it was 0-1 (6.6%). The actual scoreline of 1-0 was predicted with a 17.6% likelihood. Our data analysis correctly predicted a 1-0 win for Colombia in this match and our team at Sports Mole correctly predicted the win for Colombia.
0.33) 
-0.06) 
