EPL Round-Up
Written by James Kempton (follow him on twitter @ukbettingpro)
The EPL springs back into life this Easter weekend after an international break that has left me thirsting for some high intensity Premiership action. Weekends following such extended international breaks can often be difficult to read in terms of outright and handicap markets. The amount of jet setting many Premiership stars have done these last few days will have seriously affected the coaches ability to adequately gameplan. All these air miles may look good on your credit card statement but not so good for the energy levels in your legs for the last 20 minutes of high octane EPL. I believe the 3 bets below offer great value for EPL bettors. Whether bet as singles or in a parlay, they should keep you interested and more importantly get you to the window with profit.
Swansea v Tottenham
Goals definitely look in store at the Liberty Stadium when Spurs travel to Wales looking to get their Champions League qualification hopes back on track. There’s been 48 goals scored in Swansea’s 15 home games so far this campaign whilst Tottenham has been a part of 51 goals in their 15 away games. The sides have met three times in EPL action with Swansea yet to register a victory. The respective fixture finished all square last season as the teams shared the spoils in a 1-1 draw. I am cautious about backing Swansea outright moving forward given the apparent attitude of coach Laudrup. Their recent Carling Cup Final win is where the majority of efforts were centred placing limited emphasis on their EPL standing. Before that game Laudrup rested many senior players, giving the indication that he had given up all hope of European qualification via the League route. With just four wins in their last fifteen EPL outings for the home side and two recent nervous performances by the visitors, I will trust the trend towards goals for my bet here.
Wigan v Norwich
On paper you would think this game will be a tight defensive struggle as both sides look for valuable points to secure EPL status for next season. Such relegation battles are usually played in a nail biting circumstances with teams adopting a more defensive nature. The statistics suggest otherwise though as all three of their EPL meetings (yes I know it’s a small sample size) have seen goals aplenty. None of the three EPL meetings have seen a win for Wigan but given Norwich’s poor away record, (just one win in fifteen road games) you cannot side against the home team here. This season the home games for Wigan have gone 12-3 in favour of Over 2.5 goals. I see both teams scoring again in this meeting so we just need one further goal to cash our over ticket.
Aston Villa v Liverpool
Liverpool has lost just one of their last fourteen trips to Birmingham to take on Villa so confidence will be high in the away side’s camp for this game. The home side is deeply entrenched in a relegation battle whilst the Reds of Liverpool are pushing for European qualification. Once again I see goals raining in here despite Villa’s 15 home games seeing a relatively meagre 36 goals.
My thoughts are centred around Liverpool’s apparent inability to defend against big strong physical attackers. In Christian Benteke the home side have a beast of a striker who will cause them problems all throughout the game. The home side are far too sloppy in defence to shut out Liverpool even given Luis Suarez’s air miles accumulation this week representingUruguay. Five of the last 7 Villa home games have gone over 2.5 goals whilst the last 9 away games for Liverpool have cashed that ticket. The goal lines I have seen are set at 2.5-3 but as I cannot see either side keeping a clean sheet leading me to back the over.
Good luck with whatever you choose to bet and if you have any EPL related questions please do not hesitate to tweet me.
