Real Betis welcome Real Sociedad to La Liga with a form advantage that measures 1.33 points in the weighted five-match window, the hosts grading at 6 out of 10 for steady recent output while the visitors arrive patchy at 4.67. That gap reflects contrasting trajectories through pre-season and the tail of last term, Betis banking 3 wins from their last 5 outings and finding the net in 4 of those 5, while Sociedad have managed only 1 win across the same stretch and have yet to register a single clean sheet in any of the 5. The hosts ended their competitive campaign in May with a 2-1 home victory over Levante, a result that underscored their capacity to control fixtures on their own patch, and though they fell 1-0 away to Granada in their most recent friendly, the earlier pre-season wins at Recreativo Huelva and a 3-0 trip to Sportfreunde Lotte demonstrated a functioning attack. Betis have conceded just 5 goals across the 5 matches, keeping clean sheets in 2 of them, a defensive platform that should serve them well as competitive football resumes.

Real Sociedad's recent ledger is less convincing. Their 5-match sequence yielded 2 draws and 2 defeats alongside that single friendly win at Wolves, and the concession column tells a familiar story: 8 goals shipped in 5 outings with no shut-out to show for it. The 1-1 draw at Espanyol on 23 May and the 3-4 home reverse against Valencia a week earlier both illustrated a side that can score but struggles to stop the opposition, a pattern that persisted into pre-season with defeats to PAU and a draw with Racing Santander. Sociedad have found the net in 4 of the 5, posting 7 goals in total, so the attacking threat remains live, but the absence of any clean sheet across the sample raises questions about their ability to grind out results when the rhythm is uncertain. The 2-1 win over Wolves offered a brief lift, yet the broader picture is one of inconsistency and vulnerability at the back.

The head to head ledger across the last 9 meetings is perfectly balanced at 3 wins apiece and 3 draws, a record that offers no structural edge to either side and ensures this fixture will be settled by current form rather than historical pattern. Betis have scored 7 and conceded 5 in their last 5, Sociedad have scored 7 and conceded 8, and that two-goal difference in the defensive columns is the clearest separator in the data. The hosts have kept twice as many clean sheets and conceded at a rate of exactly one goal per match, while the visitors have shipped 1.6 per outing without a single blank against their name. When a side cannot stop scoring but cannot stop conceding either, they become vulnerable to any opponent capable of controlling tempo, and Betis have shown precisely that capacity in recent weeks.

The form gap of 1.33 points is material in a fixture this evenly matched historically, and the defensive contrast suggests Betis will carry the greater threat of a controlled performance. Sociedad's ability to score in 4 of their last 5 keeps both teams to score in play, but the hosts' superior clean sheet record and steadier recent profile point toward a result that reflects the current gulf in output. The match opens on a Friday evening, and the side with 3 wins from 5 and a functioning defensive structure holds every statistical edge over opponents who have won once and conceded in every single outing of their recent sample.