Pro bettor and football analyst Mark Stinchcombe has spied some huge value goal lines this week and is rolling out his biggest bet of the season.
I’m a big fan of taking advantage of low goal lines in the Premier League, especially when we are averaging 2.85 goals per-game this season. Looking back to our last game week Bournemouth banked the overs once again in their 2-2 draw with Newcastle, and they are back on the agenda this week as we attack on two very low looking goal lines on the south coast. We will also revisit West Ham, who provided half a win last time out on the -0.75 as they beat Huddersfield.
Two Goal Line Too Short Surely
First up though we see 15th entertain 16th as Brighton host Southampton at the Amex Stadium. Both sides have one eye over their shoulder at the relegation zone, although Brighton have a slight cushion with and a game in hand and should be viewing this as an opportunity to put some daylight between themselves and teams around the drop zone.
Browsing down this weekend’s goal lines as I do each week, I can’t believe this game is at just 2.0, with a goal expectancy of 2.20, when you consider games such as Burnley v Wolves have a line of 2.25.
The latter looks fine, but the former looks wrong when you consider Brighton’s matches this season have seen 74 goals in 29 games at an average of 2.55 per game.
Brighton’s Glenn Murray has found the back of the net 11 times in the league this season .
Southampton are also a team with high scoring matches. Ralph Hasenhuttl has presided over 15 games in charge of the Saints, which is a decent spread of games, and in those he’s seen 42 goals at 2.80pg. Reassuringly expected goals more than backs up the actual goal data with the respected sides average showing 2.80 v 2.72.
Southampton’s xG is similar to their actual amount, yet Brighton’s shows us their matches are slightly underperforming. They should be scoring more but also conceding even more as well when they are conceding the third most shots-per-game in the league. As mentioned a few times this season, they do most of their good work at home, so I’m hoping for goalmouth action at both ends.
Since being promoted to the Premier League, 51 of their 73 points have been earned at the Amex (70%) and when these two sides met earlier in the season it finished 2-2 with the expected goals fully justifying the scoreline with 4.13. This is my biggest bet of the season at four points on over 2.0 goals and it even comes with the safety of money back if just two goals are scored.
Bournemouth Banker
My second goal line bet of the weekend sees a Leicester side managed by Brendan Rodgers take on my old favourites Bournemouth. Rodgers is regarded as a manager who likes to play offensive football, and while I’m not going to read too much into Rodgers’ three games in charge it’s good to see they read 1-2, 3-1 and 2-1. Bournemouth meanwhile are the goal kings with 99 in their 31 games this season at an average of 3.19pg and it’s also noticeable they have the second worst away record on the road.
The great thing with them is they don’t even need both teams to fire in their games and 38 of their last 52 games have gone over 2.5 goals with just 10 clean sheets in their last 54. Overall, the xG in their matches is up at a healthy 3.0 per-game and the previous meeting this season between these two saw Bournemouth run out 4-2 winners, with the expected goals total returning 4.17.
Brendan Rodgers likes his teams to attack, attack, attack!
But it pays to be cautious here. If we use the 3.0 xG above as a reference, the goal expectancy in this game is 2.95, so it’s not hugely different, and it’ll just be a small bet for me here given the minor perceived value. After the biggest bet of the season above this is one of my smallest and I’ll be having just half a point on over 2.5 goals.
West Ham Winning?
For the final bet of the weekend we’re heading to the London Stadium on Saturday evening, and while the market says that Everton are clearly a level above West Ham my eyes are struggling to agree with this. The Hammers sit two places above Everton as a result of winning 12 games to the Toffee’s 11. So at worst I would say they were level in terms of ability, meaning West Ham should be stronger favourites.
Personnel wise, they have Issa Diop marshalling the defence, of whom big things are being spoken about. Similarly, Declan Rice looks to have been playing as an accomplished defensive midfielder for years and provides a platform for Felipe Anderson to serve the likes of Marko Arnautovic and Javier Hernandez upfront. Everton meanwhile start with the haphazard Jordan Pickford in goal, who after a 100 Premier League appearances, has nearly half as many errors leading to goals as he does clean sheets.
Manuel Pellegrini’s West Ham are overpriced against an unsettled Everton side.
Everton have tried a number of centre-back partnerships this season but none of them are dynamic enough to cope with Marco Silva’s expansive development of the team.
Offensively in midfield they are too reliant on Gylfi Sigurdsson with the likes of Bernard and Walcott not contributing enough and upfront they lack an identity, with Silva playing all of Richarlison, Calvert-Lewin and Cenk Tosun up there this season.
This is a manager seemingly unsettled on what he thinks is his best option.
Everton have only won four away games at Cardiff, Huddersfield, Burnley and Leicester and won just one against a side outside the bottom four. West Ham meanwhile have only lost one game at home to a side below them, which was against 12th placed Bournemouth back in August, and I’m always about sustainable edges.
I backed the Hammers last time at home to Huddersfield, and whilst I might have been lucky they came back from 1-3 down, my long-term view is they are better than their price suggests which is the key to finding good value bets. They won the game at Goodison 3-1 and this fixture last season 3-1 and I’m happy to take an effective draw no bet on West Ham at +0.0 on the Asian Handicap at 1.87 for a point to see out the weekend.
Recommended bets
- Over 2.0 goals Brighton – Southampton ~1.92 – 4 points
- Over 2.5 goals Leicester – Bournemouth ~1.76 – 0.5 points
- West Ham +0.0 ~1.87 – 1 point
Host Ali Maxwell is joined by Ian Broadrick and Mark O’Haire – taking in games from England, Scotland and Italy, with betting angles for West Ham vs Everton, Celtic vs Rangers and Frosinone vs SPAL. Ian Broadrick is a football tipster for Betting Emporium. Mark O’Haire is the brains behind WeLoveBetting and contributes to the Matchbook Insights Blog.
