Premier League: Manchester City ( -3.25 goals) - Cardiff City
It is difficult to see any such big value in the three Premier League games, where, as you will see, all three home teams are heavily favoured and have big Champions League and title motivation to win and Chelsea and Tottenham buoyed by Manchester United's loss last night. The three away teams all have varying degrees of relegation concerns, but know that points are very hard to come by against Big 6 teams, especially on the road.
Man City will go back to the top of the table, rarely slip up in these type of games, have scored 10 in their last two home starts and won 5-0 ( should have been 8) in the reverse fixture, "winning" attempts 21-2 and inside the box 18-2 (!), they also missed three big chances, hit the woodwork, were denied by 5 saves and had almost 600 passes (total and completed) more than Cardiff. In terms of player rankings, every visitor was ranked superior to the best home performer. City are 0-0-9 against big 6 teams this season with a 29-7 goal difference . They felt robbed and were unfortunate to lose 2-1 to one of those on Sunday (Chelsea) and head coach Neil Warnock ( yes, that is him pictured !) made his feelings very well known, but now that they have lost, playing another Big 6 team so soon aftewards does them few favours and as big as this handicap feels, it is hard to argue with it.
Having said all that, the visitors do not play again for 10 days, have just had a 22 days break and might as well give this a go and/or enjoy it, their PL life looks set to end after one season, so they should savour occasions such as this. The Bluebirds failed to score at Tottenham losing 1-0, but did find a goal at the other Big 6 teams losing at Chelsea ( 4-1) , Liverpool (4-1) and Arsenal (2-1) . The defending champions have conceded in 10 of 16 home games, including to 4 bottom 8 teams and did so in 11/19 last season and 14/19 in 2016-17, so have allowed 1+ goal in 64.8% of Premier League starts at the Etihad over the last three seasons. Most common scoreline in that sequence is 3-1 (12 times) , that is priced at circa 12.0- 13.0 and feels decent value, 4-1, the score by which Cardiff have already lost away to two Big 6 opponents is quoted at around 13.0 (bigger in a place or two) and the two scores combined pays 6.50 and I think that will give you a good run for your money. Hosts to win and both to score is 2.75-2.875 and I will officially put that up for 1.75 units, but feel the correct scores are significantly overpriced and suggest you take something on those, if they are an option for you.
Good Luck.
