Football betting analyst Mark O’Haire returns to share his favourite fancies with a pair of plays from the Bundesliga this weekend.
Weekend ⚽ Podcast 🎧@MarkOHaire and @adrianjclarke are 13/16 on Best Bets this season and join @DanielHussey2 to preview this weekend's action ✅
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— Matchbook Betting Exchange (@TeamMatchbook) October 18, 2023
The Bundesliga – Europe’s highest-scoring major league – has been great fun to follow in the embryonic stages of the season.
Germany’s top-flight is averaging a huge 3.52 goals per-game with 71% of encounters beating the Over 2.5 Goals line, 51% of fixtures featuring four strikes or more and 60% of outings seeing both sides oblige.
It’s therefore surprising and exciting to see an Over 2.5 Goals line available to support at 1.84 when Union Berlin entertain surprise package Stuttgart on Saturday.
Our proposed play has already banked in 11 of the duos collective 14 league fixtures this season as nine of those 14 matches also saw the Over 3.5 Goals line covered.
Union have struggled to hit last season’s heights. The capital club opened their 2023/24 account with back-to-back 4-1 victories but have since suffered five successive league losses, shipping multiple goals on four occasions.
The hosts are still searching for their first shutout with contests averaging a chunky 3.57 goals per-game.
Stuttgart were embroiled in a relegation battle last term, yet the Swabians are just a point off the top this season (W6-D0-L1).
The phenomenal form of Serhou Guirassy has helped fire Die Roten into a prominent position with Sebastian Hoeness’ side striking twice or more in six of seven outings, averaging a huge 3.14 goals per-game.
VFB have seen Over 2.5 Goals pay-out in 15 of their past 20 away Bundesliga dates going back to the beginning of last term as half of those games also covered the Over 3.5 line.
Whilst the Stadion An der Alten Forsterei has traditionally been a tight venue for goals, I’m expecting Stuttgart’s buoyant approach to engage Union in an entertaining encounter.
Basement battlers Bochum are still searching for their first Bundesliga victory of the campaign (W0-D4-L3).
Across those first seven fixtures, Die Unabsteigbaren have returned the second-lowest goals tally in the division (5), whilst simultaneously conceding a league-high 19 strikes at an average of 2.71 goals per-game.
Underlying performance data also pains an unsavoury picture.
Bochum rank rock-bottom for Expected Goals (xG) ratio, and are second-from-bottom when viewing the same metric for shots attempted from inside the penalty area.
Thomas Letsch’s team are fortunate to have four points on the board, a sentence most applicable to Bochum after they escaped RB Leipzig with a 0-0 draw before the international break.
Leipzig missed two penalties in the goalless game and created more than enough opportunities outside of the spot-kicks to pick up maximum points.
Die Unabsteigbaren are back in action on Saturday and now face a tricky trip to Freiburg – I’m quite happy to oppose Bochum here, especially so considering the away side’s rotten road record. VFB have W2-D5-L14 on their travels since returning to the Bundesliga, conceding twice or more in 14 of those 21 showdowns., shipping 2.57 goals per-game.
Bayern Munich and Stuttgart have already slaughtered Bochum in front of their own supporters, whilst lowly Augsburg deserved more from their 2-2 draw.
Freiburg should therefore be more than capable of justifying their 1.77 odds to win this fixture.
Freiburg’s three league losses this term have come against the current top-four and Christian Streich’s troops hold a W3-D1-L0 return when facing the rest of the division.
The Black Forrest boys also boast a 60% win record at their Stade Europa-Park home when entertaining Bundesliga opposition since the start of 2022/23.
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