León host leaders América without Cortizo, and América have won three of the last five meetings

The state of play

Club América lead Liga MX Apertura with 21 points from 10 matches. Club León sit sixth on 18 points from 11, so the gap is three points, and León have played one game more.

The goal columns separate them more clearly. América have scored 22 and conceded 11, a goal difference of +11. León have scored 15 and conceded 12, a goal difference of +3.

Over their last 10 matches the sides have identical records: five wins, three draws and two defeats, worth 1.8 points per match each. León's recent sequence reads DWDWLDWWWL, América's DLDWDLWWWW, which means América arrive with four straight wins in that run.

León will be without Jordi Cortizo, who is suspended for yellow card accumulation. He has started seven of the last eight matches and scored once in that spell. Luis Valadez is injured but has started only once lately. For América, Miguel Borja is suspended after a red card; he has four goals recently but only one start in eight. Raúl Zúñiga is out with a knee injury. OneFootball reports that Raphael Veiga is also missing from the trip.

Head to head

In 35 meetings América have won 14, León 11, with 10 draws. The meetings have averaged 2.66 goals.

América have not lost any of the last five: three wins and two draws. The most recent, in April, ended 3-2 to América at this same ground. Before that came a 2-0 América win, two 1-1 draws and a 1-0 América win.

The numbers behind it

América have created 17.8 expected goals and allowed 12.4 across 10 games, against 22 scored and 11 conceded. Their results sit slightly above their chance quality at the front and slightly better at the back.

León's picture is flatter. They have 14 expected goals for and 14.5 against over 11 games, and have scored 15 and conceded 12. That is close to an even side by underlying numbers, and losing Cortizo removes a near-ever-present from it.

Over the last 10 matches León have scored 13 and conceded nine; América have scored 20 and conceded 12.

Our view

The betting market implies about 30% for a León win, 26% for a draw and 44% for an América win. Our model is a little closer, at 34%, 26% and 40%. The difference is modest, and the model's more generous reading of León is not something the supplied numbers can fully explain.

Both estimates put both teams scoring at about 59% and more than 2.5 goals at about 56%. These are estimates, not predictions, and football remains high-variance.