All three pundits are back after a very successful Cheltenham Festival to cast their weathered eyes over the weekend of sporting action.
Not for the first time in LFW history, Brian Power turned a very tidy profit indeed at the Cheltenham Festival. He’s doubled his profit for the season in the last two columns and is now £330.45 in the black. Andy won a fiver, backing Sprinter Sacre at the festival, but remains £80.92 in the red. He’s bought me at least that much beer this season mind. The pro, like QPR, was screwed by the match officials at Bolton but returns for another punt this weekend.
A good week all round with £183.12 returned on Divers each way at Cheltenham and Tommy Bowe being top try scorer in the Six Nations. Most satisfying though was Cinders and Ashes taking the first at Cheltenham If you had followed the advice of the Everton preview and watched out for Donald McCain he also had Son of Flicka that was available at 66/1 on the morning of the race but finished at 16/1. A very nice touch.
After the heroic late efforts against Liverpool the lads should be in a good frame of mind for the trip to Sunderland . The Mackems will have one eye on a trip to Wembley with the cup replay coming up and I think we can get all three points and that is available at 7/2.
The details regarding Joey Barton’s exit from the field on Wednesday night have been well documented and he is sure to get a warm welcome with his Newcastle connections and at 20/1 is worth a shout for first goal. I will go for a 2-1 win to the Hoops at 14/1.
Elsewhere West Ham have got the wobbles and Reading have taken advantage recently and can do so again by beating Blackpool. Sheff Wed and MK Dons can both win away and Swindon can pick up the JP trophy on Sunday at Wembley.
Finally two horse bets for trainers who had fantastic festivals. Red Rocco runs on Sunday for Donald McCain but on Saturday Nicky Henderson can send out Heather Royal to victory
For the weekend:
£10 QPR to beat Sunderland 7/2
Barton 1st goal scorer £2.50 20/1
£5 QPR to win 2-1 14/1
£2.50 trebles and £2.50 acca
West Ham 13/10
Mk Dons 11/10
Sheff Wed 5/4
Swindon 11/8
£8.50 win 2.40 Newbury Heather Royal
£8.50 win Red Rocco Sunday 3.40 Hexham
£3 double
Previously advised:
£10 Spurs to win FA Cup 8/1
£2.50 e/w Sunderland to win FA cup 50/1
I’ll be honest with you, I’m writing this on Thursday afternoon, and I’m not sure I’ve sobered up from Wednesday night’s win against Liverpool. My word. Apologies if this is even more nonsense than usual.
I’m back after a week off, and a £5 profit last time out, thanks to Sprinter Sacre winning at Cheltenham, and refunded / voided bets on my other Cheltenham bets and my accumulator. QPR let me down at Bolton, although I think that had more to do with the refereeing than anything else.
This Saturday at Sunderland I’m confident that we can get something out of the game. Instead of going for the result, I’m going to go for the scorers instead, and stick my money on both Cisse and Mackie to score anytime, at 5/2 and an absolutely massive 9/2 respectively.
Elsewhere, I’m reinstating my traditional Robin Van Persie to score bet, he’s 12/5 to open the scoring at home against an aimless and drifting Aston Villa side.
I’m going to finish with a couple of accumulators – a cheeky away double that looks pretty good odds, and a standard accumulator.
Newcastle and Man City to both win away is currently better than 5/1 with BetVictor, and I fancy both of those results at West Brom and Stoke respectively. My main accumulator is a simple favourites six fold, with Arsenal, Liverpool, Man United, Southampton, Barca and Real all to win. That’s also about 5/1.
For the weekend:
Cisse to score anytime - £10 @ 5/2 (sportingbet)
Mackie to score anytime - £10 @ 9/2 (paddypower)
Van Persie to score first - £10 @ 12/5 (BetVictor)
Man City & Newcastle Double - £10 @ 5/1 (Betvictor)
Arsenal, Liverpool, Man United, Southampton, Barca and Real - £10 @ 5/1 (BetVictor)
Professional odds compiler Owen Goulding says…
Rangers head up north for what on paper looks a very difficult match, but maybe not as difficult as would of been a few weeks ago. As an odds compiler, I look at as many determining factors before arriving at a price, and two points stick out like sore thumbs here. Firstly the confidence that the Hoops will have gained from the 13 minute turnaround the other night cannot be under-estimated. But the second and in my opinion more important factor, is that Sunderland have their season defining game three days later. The Premier League is now just a case of seeing the season out for the Mackems, but they do have an excellent chance of returning to Wembley by beating Everton on Tuesday. Martin O'Neill will be making all the right noises, and is probably the best man-motivator in the league, but even taking this into account, there should definitely be a case of one team wanting this one much more than the other.
From QPR's point of view, a lot of us will be looking on with great interest as to the starting line up. Will Barton start? I expect he will. He has been poor for most of the season, but if there is one team that I would expect him to be up for a game against, it's Sunderland . On the flip side of performance levels is Djibril Cisse. The Frenchman has looked excellent and scored against his old club the other night. I fancy him to keep this trend up and put one past another of his old clubs on Saturday.
Bet of Weekend, Cisse to score anytime at 5/2 with SportingBet.
Prediction: My call of a 2-0 defeat against Liverpool looked absolutely spot on until the final quarter of an hour. I would have gotten away with it if it wasn't for those meddling substitutes. I'm going for much the same again here, a 2-1 defeat and After the Lord Mayor's Show sort of an afternoon brightened only by a goal for Djibril Cisse.
Sunderland to win 2-1, best priced 8/1 with Ladbrokes. Cisse to score anytime best price 5/2 with SportingBet.
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