Weekend Picks & Analysis - Hornets for the Most Cards... 

Friday 8th December 2017

In your Across the Leagues email today:

• Weekend Picks & Analysis...
• Huddersfield to regain Home form...
• Hornets for the Most Cards...
• Low goals at the Cottage...

Welcome to your Weekend Picks & Analysis email.

Every week I research the stats & fixtures, across the leagues. With the aim of identifying games with top-rated stats match-ups, bet opportunities and the best prices available with the bookies.

Ronnie gets the record...

Napoli crumbled late on in the Netherlands on Wednesday night, throwing away a 1-0 lead and 5-2 corners lead to lose 2-1 at Feyenoord with the final corners score level at 5-5.

Those outcomes took down both our Napoli -1 Match Handicap and -2 Corner Handicap picks, after Basel had provided a payout for us when winning 2-0 at Benfica on Tuesday night.

The other Champions League news is that our pre-season 4/1 (5.00) Top Scorer pick Cristiano Ronaldo found the net again – setting a new record for scoring in all 6 Group games – and is now 3 goals clear in the scorer chart and as short as 4/6 (1.67) to be Top Scorer.

This weekend’s football...

Onto the domestic action now and we have a full set of fixtures across the Premier League, Championship, League One, League Two and the Scottish Premiership.

There’s a derby-day feel to the Premier League with West Ham v Chelsea, Liverpool v Everton and Man Utd v Man City all live on TV.

• The latest League Stats tables and Team Stats for every league, and Head-to-Head comparisons for every game, are available for you to log-in and view on your members-only website – covering over 100 teams

• We have unique betting stats spanning 30+ markets, including Goals, Corners, Cards & Booking Points categories. The site is packed with info to assist you with your weekend selections

Remember we now have a mobile-friendly version of the site, too...

Log-in on your smart-phone, tablet, laptop or PC at:

www.AcrossTheLeagues.co.uk

Looking at the match-ups...

For our picks we’re looking for games where the stats match-up well for both teams – and the market & price represent decent value for us too.

Sometimes the stats are great but the betting options don’t fit.

For example...

Tottenham have won the Most Corners in 6 of their 7 Home games, and this weekend’s opponents Stoke have won the Most Corners on just 2 of their 7 Away trips this season.

Spurs are just 1/7 (1.14) in that market though, while the -4 Corner Handicap looks a bit steep – looking at the stats, they’ve only covered that in 3 of 7 league games at Wembley.

We can do better elsewhere...

Hornets for the Most Cards...

Burnley v Watford

Premier League, Sat 3pm

• Watford are ranked No.1 in the Premier League for Most Cards bets

Watford have landed Most Cards or Most Booking Points bets more times than any other Premier League team this season – and they’ve been especially prolific in Away games with 5 payouts from 7 games (71%)...

The Hornets have received the Most Cards or Booking Points in 7 of their last 10 league games overall.

Watford finished last season in 1st place for this bet, too.

This weekend they travel to Burnley who have got the Most Cards/ Booking Pts in 3 of their 7 Home games so far.

The Total Fouls stats on our site further show the disparity between the two side in the discipline department, with Watford ranked 2nd of 20 Premier League teams for Fouls committed (181) and Burnley right down in 18th place (135 Fouls).

Watford also got the Most Cards (3-1) and Most Booking Points (30 pts – 10 pts) in this Away fixture last season, and can be backed at Evens+ (2.00) to do it again this weekend. The stats make that a good value price for the Away team to get the most players in the Referee’s notepad.

Cards bets explained:

• Yellow Card = 1 Card
• Red Card = 2 Cards
• Max. for one player in a game = 3 Cards (eg. 2 Yellows resulting in a Red)

Booking Points bets explained:

• Yellow Card = 10 pts
• Red Card = 25 pts
• Max. for one player in a game = 35 pts (eg. 2 Yellows resulting in a Red)

Huddersfield to regain Home form...

Huddersfield v Brighton

Premier League, Sat 3pm

• Brighton have won the Most Corners in just one of 8 Away games in comps this season

We had Huddersfield on our radar at the start of the season, after their 91% Home Most Corners record in the Championship last season...

They came up to the Premier League with Brighton, and this weekend the two clubs meet for the sixth season running. Huddersfield have won the Most Corners in 4 of those last 5 Home meetings with Brighton, including a 9-2 corners score in a 3-1 win in February of this year.

Moving into the present day and Huddersfield have won the Most Corners at the John Smith’s Stadium against Leicester, Southampton and Newcastle this season...

Brighton have been out-cornered in 7 out of 8 Away games in all comps – including 6 out of 7 in the Premier League which puts them joint-bottom of the division for Most Corners payouts.

Huddersfield’s corners form has admittedly dropped off in recent weeks (as has their Match Result form – losing 4 in a row), but 3 of their last 4 Home games have been against Top Six sides Man Utd, Man City and Tottenham.

This weekend, against a similar level opponent to themselves, Huddersfield are a more than fair price to regain their corner-winning form.

Low goals at the Cottage...

Fulham v Birmingham

Championship, Sat 3pm

• Birmingham are the No.1 team in the Championship for Under 2.5 Goals

This game sees two of the Championship’s top-rated Under 2.5 Goals teams go head-to-head...

Birmingham are on a 9-game run for that bet, and are ranked 1st in the division for Under 2.5 Goals with an 80% overall record (16 out of 20 games).

That’s a very impressive strike-rate and Saturday’s host Fulham also have a significant 80% Home record for low-scoring games – with 8 out of 10 league fixtures at Craven Cottage seeing 2 or less Total Goals.

That includes each of Fulham’s last 4 Home games paying out on Under 2.5 Goals, with 1-0, 1-1, 0-2 and 1-1 score-lines.

Birmingham have failed to score in 3 their last 4 Away games, with the score-lines 1-1, 2-0, 2-0, 2-0.

Last season both meetings between these sides were goalless at half time with the Blues eventually squeezing a 1-0 win.

The current form says to expect another tight game here, and the Under 2.5 Goals odds are slightly in our favour with the bookies actually making the ‘Over’ option the marginal favourite.

Midweek games coming up...

I’ll be back on Monday with a Weekend Stats Review, quickly followed by Picks & Analysis for the midweek Premier League games on Tuesday – as the festive football list begins to pick up pace.

Enjoy the football...

Best wishes,

Oliver Upstone

Across the Leagues