Friday, March 29, 2024

Carabao Cup Final – 3 Outside bets that could be worth a punt

This afternoon, Manchester City will take on Aston Villa in the Carabao Cup final. As you might expect, Pep Guardiola’s men are massive favourites for this match and as a result, match betting seems somewhat futile – but we’ve found a few outside bets that could be worth a fiver…

A bit of Carabao Cup history for City and Villa

If Manchester City are able to pick up the win today as we all expect them to, they will lift the Carabao Cup trophy for the third consecutive season. They’ve still got a little way to go before they nab the record for most consecutive League Cup wins though – that record belongs to Liverpool who won it four times on the bounce in the early 80s. 

All in all, City have dominated this competition over the last seven years or so. They’ve won it four times in that period, beating Sunderland in 2014, Liverpool in 2016, Arsenal in 2018 and Chelsea last year. In total, City have lifted this trophy six times, with their first win coming in 1970 as they beat West Bromwich Albion in extra time. 

Aston Villa have a decent history in the competition too. Since its inception in 1961, Villa have lifted the trophy five times and hold the honour of being the first ever winners of the English League Cup. The last time they picked up this trophy was back in 1996, beating Leeds 3-0 in the final. 

Aston Villa have been in the final since then though, most recently in 2010 as they lost to Manchester United. This year, it seems it could be another runners up medal for the Villains – the odds for Villa to win this game 1-0 are the same as they are for City to win it 7-0 (50/1)…

Red Card + Half Time Result Draw, Full Time Result Man City – 22/1

Both of these teams have a penchant for conceding their goals later in games. Villa have 23 of their 52 goals after the 60th minute, while City have let in seven of their 28 goals in the last 15 minutes of games.

Carabao Cup

Expect the early stages to be somewhat cagey, with Villa back in shape and City poking the ball around like some Tika-Taka nightmare (think Spain in 2016?). The second half will be where the action happens.

Which leads us nicely into the second part of our little parlay (double for those on the English side of the pond). Villa will frustrate City and City will obviously roll out their tactical fouling machine to stop Villa’s counter-attacking. This will give us at least one juicy flash point where the ref, or more likely VAR, will bring us some entertainment.

Tyrone Mings to score – 28/1

Now this one sounds a bit far fetched as the mop-headed centre -back only has two goals so far this season. But Villa represent a very dangerous threat from set-pieces having netted 10 times so far this season in the Premier League alone. That accounts for 29.4% of their goals.

For their part City have suffered this season since the departure of Vincent Kompany, with fully 21% of their goals conceded coming from set-pieces. It’s a statistical match made in heaven and gives us a nice little outsider with a very good upside.

Over 10 Corners + Most Goals in 2nd Half + Jesus to score last for City – 9/1

This is a nice little follow on from our first two bets. For the reasons stated above City will get a lot of the ball and Villa will defend a lot, leading to blocked shots, and clearances galore at that end of the pitch. Subsequently we like the over 10 corners before we even factor in Villa’s corners.

Again, both of these teams conceded a lot of goals in the second half, and assuming Villa do eventually concede a goal this game will open up in the last 30 minutes and become a banked for the second half having more goals. And if there’s one man we fancy for late goals when there’s more space it’s the man from Brazil, Gabriel Jesus.

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