Welcome to our first ever edition of Shit Tips; a series in which we’ll try our hardest to help you, our valued listeners, followers and fans, to win some extra beer tokens by suggesting a range of bets with a typically large dose of Abbey Stand Pod’s wit and pessimism. Winners are far from guaranteed, at times actively discouraged.
Our first round of tips corresponds to the fixtures on Tuesday 30th January 2018.
1) COVENTRY CITY VS. CAMBRIDGE UNITED – COVENTRY CITY TO WIN TO NIL
This is a podcast, and a page, created by Cambridge United fans. By now we know the drill: we don’t score away from home (we’re the lowest scorers away from home in the whole division), and we don’t beat sides in the playoff positions (just six points taken from a possible twenty-four against current top-seven sides). Add to this Coventry’s excellent home record, the seemingly unstoppable form of the Sky Blues’ forward Marc McNulty, and their imperious home defence, and only one outcome seems likely: a win and a clean sheet for the hosts. Therefore, we recommend COVENTRY & NO in the RESULT/BOTH TEAMS TO SCORE market, currently priced at 7/4. If you’re not feeling so brave, a straightforward Coventry win looks pretty likely here, so if you fancy Mark Robins’ men to follow up their FA Cup heroics with a win against an out of sorts Cambridge side, 17/20 looks a pretty decent price.
2) MIDDLESBROUGH VS. SHEFFIELD WEDNESDAY – UNDER 1.5 GOALS
This is a fixture which pits Tony Pulis against Jos Luhukay. Both are managers who, during their careers, have built up reputations for being arch pragmatists. We all remember the former’s reign at West Brom, during which he would regularly line up with four centre backs, and the latter attained his name as an excellent defensive coach during his time in Germany, where he won promotion with Hertha Berlin back to the Bundesliga. Both sides have typically defensive outlooks; Sheffield Wednesday have failed to find the net on four of their last five matches, with Middlesbrough not having had too much more success on that front themselves. Therefore, we are suggesting that this game will see UNDER 1.5 GOALS, i.e. either zero or one. This is currently priced up at 2/1 in the ALTERNATIVE UNDER/OVER market, meaning that a £5 stake will return £15.
3) BLACKBURN ROVERS VS. WALSALL – BLACKBURN -1 HANDICAP
Blackburn are third, and heavily fancied to finish the season in the automatic promotion places, whereas Walsall currently sit eighteenth in the league, just three points above the relegation zone, and will likely spend the remainder of their season battling against the drop. Blackburn have one of the best home records in the league, Walsall have one of the worst away records in the league. Everything about this match screams out *home banker*, so why not go one step further? We’re suggesting BLACKBURN TO WIN WITH A -1 HANDICAP, so to win by two clear goals, 2-0, 3-1 etc. or better. This can be found in the HANDICAP RESULT market, and is currently priced rather generously at 11/8, which may not hang around too long, and it could be reasonably suggested that this will be backed into around evens by the time kick-off approaches at Ewood Park.
4) LUTON TOWN VS. WYCOMBE WANDERERS – OVER 2.5 GOALS & BOTH TEAMS TO SCORE
Make no mistake about it, Luton and Wycombe are two teams who know where the back of the net is. They boast the two best scoring records in the league, having found the back of the onion bag a staggering one-hundred-and-sixteen times between them already this season. Let’s have a look at some of the players that might be adding to that tally when these two sides clash at Kenilworth Road. The mercurial Danny Hylton: he’s scored fifteen in the league alone this season, three of those coming against the U’s in that (now infamous) seven nil drubbing back in November. Adebayo ‘The Beast’ Akinfenwa: an absolute colossus of a forward, he’ll be causing those poor, poor Luton Town defenders no end of trouble with his strength and guile, and not only has he had the most shots of any forward in League Two, he’s also quite good at finding the net, having done so on thirteen occasions for the Chairboys so far in the league this season.
Apart from the aforementioned Hylton and Akinfenwa, this match will also likely feature the likes of James Collins, Luke Berry and Craig Mackail-Smith who have all hit goals on a regular basis at League Two level throughout their careers, and so an absolute goal-fest could be on the cards here. We’re tipping OVER 2.5 GOALS & BOTH TEAMS TO SCORE in the TOTAL GOALS/BOTH TEAMS TO SCORE market, and you can get 6/5 on this at time of writing. So all we need for this one to land is for there to be three or more goals in the game, with each side contributing one of those. In fact, we’re so confident that this one will live up to its billing that this is also our NAP for the evening’s fixtures.
So, to recap:
COVENTRY CITY VS. CAMBRIDGE UNITED – COVENTRY CITY TO WIN TO NIL – 7/4
MIDDLESBROUGH VS. SHEFFIELD WEDNESDAY – UNDER 1.5 GOALS – 2/1
BLACKBURN ROVERS VS. WALSALL – BLACKBURN -1 HANDICAP – 11/8
LUTON TOWN VS. WYCOMBE WANDERERS – OVER 2.5 GOALS & BOTH TEAMS TO SCORE – 6/5 NAP
Based on an average £5 stake, backing all of our selections would give you nearly £30 of profit, or put in simple terms: a cracking afternoon down at The Dobblers. Feeling extra brave? Back our selections as a fourfold, currently priced up at 28/1, meaning that a £5 stake would return you a whopping £145. What’s not to like? Just wait for the inevitable to happen… See you on Saturday, happy gambling.
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