Green Bay Packers vs Minnesota Vikings: Green Bay to send Vikings packing

30Dec 2012

This one's simple. A win for Minnesota books their berth in the playoffs. A win for Green Bay secures the Pack a first-round bye...

The carrot of a slot in the play-offs is probably more of an incentive for the Vikings than a first round bye is for the Packers but Minnesota are going to find reaching the Promised Land tough going. Their opponents, Green Bay, are red hot having rolled the Titans over last week in a 55-7 rout.

Not only was the top rated quarterback in the league, Aaron Rodgers, at his imperious best with three touchdowns and 342 yards but the defence stepped it up and recorded seven sacks with the outstanding Clay Matthews in the thick of it again after injury.

Minnesota will be pinning a lot of their hopes on miracle man Adrian Peterson, their star running back who has compiled a record-breaking season after suffering a serious knee injury only a year ago. He is 102 yards away from a 2000-yard season and 208 yards short of Eric Dickerson's single season record of 2105.

He combines well with second season quarterback Christian Ponder who is able to utilise his mobility around the pocket to keep defences guessing. Concentrate too much on Peterson and Ponder will throw on the move; rush or contain Ponder and Peterson can wriggle free.

Packers Defensive Coordinator Dom Capers put the key to success against the Vikings neatly this week when he said; 'stop the run, make the game one-dimensional, and then try to put pressure on the quarterback.'

This should be within the grasp of an improving Packer defence that has given up a measly average of 13.5 points in its recent four-game winning streak.

A real problem Adrian Peterson and the and the rest of the Vikings have is that even when AP ran for 210 yards on 21 carries against Green Bay on December 2nd it still wasn't enough for the Vikes to record a victory.

Much as I'd like to join in with the Peterson cheerleading I think he's got next to no chance of breaking the single season record so I'll be hoping the party is well and truly pooped with a Green Bay win.

Minnesota are, however, capable of scoring first so I'll top up my main bet with a sprinkling of 8.0 on Minnesota/Green Bay in the Half Time/Full Time market, and add a speculative nibble on rookie Jarius Wright to be the First Touchdown Scorer @ 17.0.

He looked pretty dangerous against Houston's tough defence last week in only his seventh NFL start and must be value at that price to haul one in early.

Recommended Bets

Green Bay to win @ 1.59

Half Time / Full Time result Minnesota/Green Bay @ 8.0

Jarvius Wright First Touchdown Scorer @ 17.0