We are going to completely ignore the fact that this tipster has put up Southampton for goals-related bets twice so far this season, and on both occasions, a 0-0 has immediately followed. However, on both of those 0-0 occasions, Southampton should have really taken some of their chances. Firstly, there was a big chance to win the South Coast derby, which was spurned, and then they created 3.1 xG at home to Swansea on the weekend and failed to find the net.

Indeed, Southampton are now massively underperforming their expected goals total, which is second in the league. Both teams actually have the right balance of chance creation for this bet. Bristol City are just behind Southampton in xG creation, and both teams are in mid-table for xG against, both conceding over 1 xG per game.

So we have two good attacking teams with mediocre defences here, which is a great recipe for this wager. Southampton are now eight from 10 Championship matches with a BTTS return, and Bristol City are six from ten as well.

Bristol City are averaging 5.5 corners per match this season, a higher-than-average total. Their matches are seeing 10.17 corners on average, so this is consistently higher than the chosen line here. Indeed, nine of Bristol City’s 12 matches in all competitions have beaten this 8.5 corner line.

Saints actually eclipse Bristol City’s corner numbers, and they have actually been very consistent in their corner totals recently. They average 5.92 corners per match so far this season, with their matches averaging 9.38 corners per match. Southampton haven’t failed to win any fewer than five corners in any match so far this season, which is quite remarkable.

If we count on that trend of Southampton’s to continue, then we would only need a maximum of four corners from Bristol City to make this a winner. That has happened in all bar one home matches this season, the exception being three won against Ipswich.

The Brazilian was brought in from the Bundesliga quite late on in the window, and his arrival may have flown under the radar somewhat, but his impact, initially in the EFL Cup against Liverpool and now from the start against Derby and at the weekend against Swansea, was difficult to ignore.

Scienza is a major ball carrier, but that seems to have been picked up by the bookmakers very early; instead, it is shots angle that looks to be the place to back him. He has taken 11 shots in his three starts in all competitions, and is currently averaging just over four shots per 90. Obviously, this figure is going to reduce over time, but at the moment, there is no way of suggesting that a line of 2+ should be out of range for Scienza.

From his eight Championship shots so far, six have been from outside the box. This is always a positive sign for a shots bet as he will more often get those opportunities to shoot from distance, no matter how the defence in front of him is set up. He has shot from inside the box a couple of times as well, so he is getting into good goalscoring positions on top of his range shooting.

This is an opportunity to take advantage of a positional change that doesn’t seem to be baked into the prices for Vyner at the moment. Vyner has been playing as a centre-back for most of the last few years, but has played in central midfield many times in his career, as well as covering there for the last three matches as a result of injuries to the usual midfielders.

Those three matches have seen Vyner play the full 90 minutes on each occasion, and he has totted up six shots in those matches as well. This includes three shots against Norwich at the weekend, two of which were on target as well.

He has covered this line in the last four matches that he has played, and it is an occasion on which we need to ignore the long sample size averages as they don’t apply here. He should be shorter based on the way that he is playing whilst in midfield, therefore we should have a little team news check to ensure that this cover in midfield continues.