Skip to main content

Football Form Labs weekend preview

Not getting enough of your football betting? Put some stats behind your gut instincts and work out when to really lump on. One of the very best in the business is Football Form Labs who have shared their wisdom with a preview of some of this week's action. You can also follow Football Form Labs on Twitter, @footballformlab

--------------------------

Football Form Labs provide the most effective football betting software on the market with the ability to analyse games both pre-match and in-play across 50 different leagues. You can also generate your own models and see the statistical impact players have when they are missing. Until the end of September, they have a great deal for new subscribers!

Take advantage of these huge savings to get Form Lab Black for just £40 per month or as little as £300 per annum. – Try Form Lab Black here with codes FLBMONTHLYPROMO (for a monthly subscription), FLBQUARTERPROMO (quarterly sub discount) or FLBANNUALPROMO (annual sub discount)

If you prefer to start off with our pre-match analysis software, Form Lab Max, you can now purchase that for only £20 per month or just £150 per annum. That's less than 50p per day to get the chance to find bets across all 50 leagues we cover! – Try Form Lab Max here with FLMMONTHLYPROMO, FLMQUARTERPROMO or FLMANNUALPROMO

For that you will receive the best and most comprehensive football betting software available which will allow you to find hundreds of value betting possibilities every week across 50 different leagues both pre-match and in-play.

And furthermore you get a 2 WEEK FREE TRIAL when you first sign up!

------------------------------

PREVIEW: Liverpool v Everton (Sat, 12:45)

The Merseyside Derby kicks off the Premier League weekend and if last season’s meetings are anything to go by we’ll be in for a cracker. Liverpool won this fixture 4-0 back in January while the first derby last season was a 3-3 at Goodison and Sturridge and Suarez scored in both matches.

With Liverpool having lost three of their last four matches and Everton coming off a shock defeat at home against Crystal Palace this is a crucial game as both teams look to get some momentum and move up the table. Liverpool have won 17 of their 21 home games since the start of last season but the sale of Luis Suarez and the injury to Daniel Sturridge has clearly weakened them significantly in attack while their defensive vulnerabilities remain.

Everton have scored first in four of their opening five games so a return of just one win will be a huge disappointment as they’ve conceded 13 times already. However, their away form since the latter part of last season is good with five wins and just one defeat in their last eight away games. Furthermore, in the past two seasons their record away to teams that finished 3rd-7th is W1-D4-L3 and they look perfectly capable of avoiding defeat at Anfield, as they’ve done in two of the past four seasons. With that in mind the 3.9 for the draw looks well worth taking, particularly as Liverpool have a crucial trip to Basel on Wednesday to think about and so may not risk the recovering Sturridge.

With these two defences ‘overs’ will definitely be popular and it’s hard to argue with. 15 of Liverpool’s last 18 home games have had at least three goals with 12 having four or more strikes. However, six of Everton’s eight trips to last season’s top nine had fewer than three goals and we could be in for a more cautious derby than in recent meetings. It’s worth waiting for the team news before getting involved in the goals markets but Liverpool have played just two games since the start of last season without Sturridge and Suarez - their last two matches – and they’ve scored only once, so Under 2.5 Goals currently looks some value at 2.38.

PREVIEW: Arsenal v Spurs (Sat, 16:00)

Arsenal are one of only two teams to be unbeaten after five games but with three draws they are already four points off the pace and have been unimpressive so far. Spurs, meanwhile, have picked up just one point from their last three games and now face a very busy couple of months with Europa League alongside domestic commitments.

The Gunners are unbeaten in their last 20 home games and while they’ve rarely beaten the very best in recent seasons they’ve been superb against teams just below the top level. Against teams that finished 5th-10th in the past two seasons they’ve W7-D4-L1 with six wins by more than one goal.

Spurs, meanwhile, lost at each of the top four last season, including two 4-0 losses and a 6-0, and failed to score at any of the five teams that finished above them. Pochettino has been bought in to improve their performances in these games but Southampton lost eight of their 12 matches last season against the top six whilst conceding 2.17 goals per game. At 1.8 Arsenal are worth backing here, particularly given their superb home record in the derby, and they are also worth supporting on the -1.5 Asian Handicap at about 3.0.

North London derbies have a history of goals in recent seasons and both sides have been more ‘overs’ than ‘unders’ so far this term. Six of Arsenal’s last eight home games have had at least three goals as have eight of Spurs’ 10 trips to top-six finishers in the past two seasons. While Pochettino didn’t enjoy much success against the big boys last term his Southampton side were not afraid to attack in those matches and Over 2.5 Goals is a good price at 1.8.

Dirty Derbies Dirtier in Serie A:

The Premier League is not the only league featuring major derbies this weekend as Schalke take on Dortmund in the Bundesliga and Genoa face Sampdoria in Italy. Out of the Big 5 leagues, Serie A comes second only to La Liga for the worst disciplinary record. In the past 11 years, there have been 4.49 yellow cards per game and 0.30 sending offs, accumulating 52.4 booking points. So if regular Serie A matches are this fiery, how dirty must their derbies be?

Well it turns out very. In the three biggest Serie A derby matches (Milan derby, Genoa v Sampdoria, and Lazio v Roma), there have been, on average, 83.5 booking points per derby (56 derbies in last 11 years). That is the equivalent of more than three extra yellows, every derby match. The average Premier League derby game saw 42.7 booking points – less than one extra caution more than the average Premier League game. English derbies seem a bit timid in comparison.

Probably the most famous Italian derby is the ‘Derby della Madonnina’ (AC vs Inter), played at the iconic San Siro. On average, this game produces 71.8 booking points, as well as a red card nearly every other match. This, however, is the ‘tamest’ of the biggest four derbies, despite having over 14 more booking points than the Premier League’s dirtiest derby.

Without doubt, however, the most ill-tempered and fiery Italian derby in recent years is Genoa v Sampdoria. A recent encounter in the 2009/10 season, reached a staggering 200 booking points, involving four red cards, and ten bookings. This isn’t an anomaly either. The season before, the derby produced 175 booking points. In the last six meetings where Genoa have been the nominal home team (they share the ground), five of the games have generated over 100 booking points and involved at least eight bookings and one red card, with an average of 130 booking points from the six derbies. A sending off this weekend can be backed at 2.6.

The other major derby is in the capital, between Roma and Lazio. This, like the Genoa v Sampdoria derby, produces a tremendous amount of ill-discipline. In the last 11 years, none of the 22 Rome derbies have had fewer than 50 booking points. Moreover, in the last six seasons, the 12 derbies have averaged 104 booking points, with seven totals of over 100. 10 of these 12 games have seen a red card, and five have seen more than one player take an early shower.

Player Analysis:

Using Form Lab Black’s player analysis tool we’ve looked around Europe and found three teams who will be missing important players in this round of matches and without them they look set to struggle.

N.B. Appearances mentioned below relate to starting and completing an hour unless otherwise specified.

Championship
Birmingham v Fulham
Lee Novak, Forward, Birmingham


Novak has missed 21 of Birmingham’s 54 matches since the start of last season and without him they’ve lost 13 times including picking up just two points from their last nine home games in his absence. Fulham might be at the foot of the table but they might be worth backing to take three points here at 2.75.

Nottingham Forest v Brighton
Andy Reid and Chris Cohen, Nottingham Forest


Forest are missing two key players in Reid and Cohen and it’s been a familiar story as both missed much of the second half of last season. In the 18 matches that both have been missing for since 2013/14 Forest have W3-D5-L10. This compares to a record of W11-D6-L2 when both have been playing. With that in mind the 1.75 for Brighton the Double Chance looks a good bet.

Visit Football Form Labs to turn your gut feel into proper, profitable research.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Spot-fixing - you will never, ever be able to stop it

According to this report , IPL tournaments so far have been rife with spot-fixing - that is fixing minor elements of the game - runs in a single over, number of wides bowled etc. The curious part of that article is that the Income Tax department are supposed to have found these crimes. What idiot would be stupid enough to put down 'big wad of cash handed to me by bookie' as a source of income? Backhanders for sportsmen, particularly in a celebrity- and cricket-obsessed culture like India are not rare. They could come from anything like turning up to open someone's new business (not a sponsor, but a 'friend of a friend' arrangement), to being a guest at some devoted fan's dinner party etc. The opportunities are always there, and there will always be people trying to become friends with players and their entourage - that is human nature. This form of match-fixing (and it's not really fixing a match, just a minor element of it) is very hard to prove, but also, ...

lay the field - my favourite racing strategy

Dabbling with laying the field in-running at various prices today, not just one price, but several in the same race. Got several matched in the previous race at Brighton, then this race came along at Nottingham. Such a long straight at Nottingham makes punters often over-react and think the finish line is closer than it actually is. As you can see by the number of bets matched, there was plenty of volatility in this in-play market. It's rare you'll get a complete wipe-out with one horse getting matched at all levels, but it can happen, so don't give yourself too much risk...

It's all gone Pete Tong at Betfair!

The Christmas Hurdle from Leopardstown, a good Grade 2 race during the holiday period. But now it will go into history as the race which brought Betfair down. Over £21m at odds of 29 available on Voler La Vedette in-running - that's a potential liability of over £500m. You might think that's a bit suspicious, something's fishy, especially with the horse starting at a Betfair SP of 2.96. Well, this wasn't a horse being stopped by a jockey either - the bloody horse won! Look at what was matched at 29. Split that in half and multiply by 28 for the actual liability for the layer(s). (Matched amounts always shown as double the backers' stake, never counts the layers' risk). There's no way a Betfair client would have £600m+ in their account. Maybe £20 or even £50m from the massive syndicates who regard(ed) Betfair as safer than any bank, but not £600m. So the error has to be something technical. However, rumour has it, a helpdesk reply (not gospel, natur...