CELTIC begin the defence of their Scottish Premiership title when they welcome Aberdeen to Parkhead on Sunday afternoon.
The Hoops wrestled the trophy off Old Firm rivals Rangers last season, in what was a quickfire culmination of their plan to return to the top of Scottish football.
That represented a strong debut season in Scotland for Ange Postecoglou, who also steered his side to Scottish League Cup glory.
As such, there will be a party atmosphere at Celtic Park on Sunday as the newly-crowned champions unfurl the flag ahead of their curtain-raiser with Aberdeen.
As for the Dons, they endured a forgetful season last year, labouring to a 10th place in the top-flight – the club’s lowest league position since 2014.
Unsurprisingly, Aberdeen boss Jim Goodwin has since rolled the dice with a raft of summer signings and his new-look sides' flawless League Cup group stage showing serves as reason for optimism.
Outright Betting
Celtic, who have not lost a Scottish Premiership match since last September, head into their opening match of the season as short-priced 3/10 (Bet 365) favourites.
Aberdeen are winless in each of their last 14 league matches against Celtic and that is reflected in the odds with a Dandies triumph trading at 10/1 (William Hill) while a point apiece has been priced up at 5/1 (Betfred).
Betting Angles
Celtic are unsurprisingly huge favourites here so I'll head to the Bet Builder market to get a bigger price by combining Celtic to win, over five Celtic corners and over zero Aberdeen cards, a 20/23 (Bet 365) shot.
Celtic were well-nigh flawless at their Parkhead fortress in the Scottish Premiership last season, posting 16 wins from 19 and avoiding defeat in the process, and you don't get the impression that this is a squad who'll let complacency set in.
As such, I'm more than happy to back the Hoops to hit the ground running on Sunday, but to nudge up the price, I'll also throw over five Celtic corners into the equation.
Celtic averaged a colossal 9.24 corners per-game in the Scottish Premiership last season, covering the 6+ flag kick line in a whopping 30 of their last 33 league games.
Given that Celtic are expected to dominate the ball for long stages at Parkhead on Sunday, I'll complete the Bet Builder with a minimum of one Aberdeen card.
The Dons clocked up over two cards per 90 minutes last term, not to mention 17 of the 19 sides to visit Celtic Park on league duty last season collected at least one booking.
Elsewhere, dipping into UniBet‘s Match Multi market, it's the 7/4 (UniBet) available on Celtic to win, Celtic to take the most corners and Aberdeen to receive the most cards that also caught my eye.
This is the type of assignment that the hosts were particularly efficient in dealing with last season and the aforementioned multiple looks like a nice way of trying to squeeze some value out of what should be an opening day Celtic success.
This Scottish Premiership match between Celtic and Aberdeen will be played on Jul 31, 2022 and kick off at 16:30. Check below for our tipsters best Celtic vs Aberdeen prediction. You may also visit our dedicated betting previews section for the most up to date previews.
