Al Hilal vs Pakhtakor prediction 11.03.2025 | AFC Champions League

• Competition: AFC Champions League, 1/8 Finals, 2nd Leg
• Date: Tuesday, 11th March, 2025
• Kickoff: 20:00 UK / 21:00 CET
• Venue: Kingdom Arena (Riyadh)

After a 1:0 win for Pakhtakor in the first leg of the AFC Champions League 1/8 Fianals against Al Hilal, the teams will face off in the second leg in Saudia Arabia at Kingdom Arena.

Last season, Al Hilal managed to win both the domestic league and the domestic cup titles and reached the AFC Champions League Semi-Finals, where they lost 5:4 on aggregate to the eventual champs, Al Ain. This year, even though they are only four points away from the top spot in the Saudi Professional League, Al Hilal looks a bit worse, in our opinion. Right now, they are in poor form by their standards, losing three of the last five, and this crucial game against Pakhtakor comes at a challenging moment. However, most football pundits expect Al Hilal to bounce back with a big win and eventually secure the next phase of the competition.

After winning five consecutive titles between the 2019 and 2023 seasons, Pakhtakor played an absolutely terrible season, at least by their standards, in the Uzbekistan Super League. They finished the season in 6th place with 38 points from 26 matches - 14 points away from the top spot. However, if they make a deep run in the AFC Champions League, that would somewhat compensate for their bad performance in the domestic league.

Al Hilal vs Pakhtakor pick: Over 2.5 goals

Al Hilal were surprisingly inconsistent in the recent period. However, at home, they are really efficient as they scored an incredible 29 goals in the last seven games - 4.14 per game. Throughout the season, they were fantastic at home, scoring two or more goals in 15 out of 17 games (88%) and three or more in 13 out of 17 matches (76%). Now, since they have a one-game deficit from the first leg, they will have to open up from the start, which could easily result in a high-scoring game.

Also, Al Hilal struggled defensively, keeping a clean sheet just once in the last five matches! A good offense and not-that-great defense makes them excellent for this type of bet.

Meanwhile, Pakhtakor aren't a team that possess such offensive talent as Al Hilal. However, in the first game, they created many goalscoring chances and proved they were more than capable of scoring against the Saudi Arabian champs.

Considering all the above, we expect an exciting game from the very start with at least three goals, possibly with both teams scoring.