Championship Betting Tips

I remember watching Cozier-Duberry years ago in a reserve fixture that Blackburn played in and he was electric. His ability is reaching new heights every week and he’s in sensational form for ‘Boro.

Cozier-Duberry is left-footed, playing from the right. He’s capable of wonder goals and loves cutting in and letting fly.

This season he’s averaged a huge 4.59 shots per 90 minutes in the Championship. His 24 shots is the second highest in the squad behind Lankshear, who has played nearly double the minutes.

The winger racked up eight shots in his last match against Cardiff, with three on target.

Famewo will be the man tasked with stopping Cozier-Duberry. Cozier-Duberry hasn’t been a prolific foul-winner so far this season, however he has drawn one in each of his last two and last season he drew 1.12 per 90 minutes and was the fourth most fouled player in Bolton’s squad.

As for Famewo, he was booked in his last outing and has averaged 1.19 fouls per 90 minutes so far this season.

He has committed a foul in all bar one game this season and the game he failed to do so was when he was substituted at half-time against QPR.

Sheehan is a very busy man in the middle of the park for Bolton. He has committed the most fouls in their squad this season (15) but is also their most fouled player (18).

Given how short his prices are to commit a foul, and the data actually being better for drawing them, this looks like a nice little price.

Sheehan has drawn an average of 1.65 fouls per 90 minutes and comes up against a ‘Boro midfield who average 2.35 fouls per 90 (Morris and Berhalter).

Sheehan has drawn at least one foul in 10 of his 11 Championship appearances this season.

‘Boro are the heavy favourites here and have averaged a huge 2.07 xG in the Championship this season.

They have immensely talented forward players at their disposal and could well cover this line on their own if they’re at their best.

‘Boro matches have averaged 3.45 goals, the second-highest in the division with 73% of their games having three or more goals, including four of their last five.

As for Bolton, their average sits at 3.00 per match and a 64% strike rate for over 2.5 goals.

They can definitely offer a threat. Their xG rises dramatically at home to 1.87, compared to 1.21 away.

I backed this selection in my write up for Charlton’s defeat at Watford last week and I’m surprised Coventry isn’t sitting at odds closer to 1.14 than the 1.30 available.

Coventry has averaged 1.82 fouls per 90 minutes in the Championship so far this season and has been booked in each of his last two games.

The Irish midfielder has fouled in every single Championship game this season. He also fouled in each of his three starts for Ireland over the international break.

Midfielder Pelle Mattsson is also Norwich’s most fouled player, he draws an average of 1.76 fouls per 90 minutes.

Not only adept at winning fouls, the Dane is busy committing them. He’s averaged 2.55 per 90 minutes this season and his 26 total fouls is more than double the next highest player in the Norwich squad. It’s also the second highest in the division.

He’s committed two or more fouls in each of his last five matches and throughout the season his consistency in this market has been remarkable.

Mattsson has made two or more fouls in nine of his 10 Championship starts. He’s racked up as many as five on two occasions and four on another.

Another important part of the Mattson selection is the correlation with Oliver Skipp drawing fouls for Charlton. This was another selection I took last week.

Skipp was fouled twice in just 45 minutes in the defeat to Watford and has been fouled in five of his seven appearances on loan at Charlton.

He’s drawn an average of 1.43 per 90 minutes and with Mattsson lining up on the other side and being such a frequent fouler, the two selections should go hand-in-hand.

A Mattsson foul or two on Skipp would be the perfect set up for the bet builder.

Leaburn’s foul numbers are off the chart. He’s made 24 fouls this season, that’s six more than the aforementioned Conor Coventry who was averaging 1.82 fouls per 90 minutes.

By comparison, Leaburn is racking up a huge 2.73 fouls per 90 minutes this season. His 24 fouls ranks him third in the Championship.

Leaburn plays off the front so will come in to contact with defenders and midfield. Again, coming back to Mattsson who is a big foul drawer, the 10th highest in the division in-fact.

Cordoba and McConville do combine for just above 1.00 fouls per 90 minutes too, with 11 between them so far this campaign.

Boreham Wood are incredible. They’ve won 11, drawn 2 from 13 league games, scoring 34 times.

They average 1.91 xG at home and have the most creative player in the league, Zak Brunt who has 14 assists in 13 league games.

Fylde are drastically overperforming on the road. They’ve averaged 1.62 xGA and just 1.27 xG for.

As expected, Robbie Savage’s kamikaze football has led to goals in Peterborough’s games.

There has been 13 goals in the three games he’s managed with a minimum of four goals in each.

Their xG in those three has jumped to 1.68 from 1.39 so they are creating more.

Bromley have the worst defence in the league and the worst xGA at 2.04 and their matches have averaged 3.40 goals.

These two boast 82 and 73% strike rates for BTTS this season, amongst the highest in the Championship and both have seen this selection land in four of their last five games.

Blackburn’s xG rises considerably at home, where they create 1.60 xG compared to 1.01 away.

Wrexham’s xG is pretty modest but not terrible, however Blackburn do give up a lot of chances.

They’ve kept just 2 clean sheets and concede an average of 1.70 xG.

Arsenal played really well at the Allianz Arena in the Champions League during the week, earning a point thanks to a late equaliser from Declan Rice.

Arteta’s side controlled the game and only conceded to a wonderful defence splitting pass from Harry Kane and a penalty, which the former Tottenham man also converted.

Arsenal have won six of their seven Premier League games this season, with the exception of that 3-0 defeat to Brighton - who are proving to be one of the best sides in the league this term.

Arsenal have won three of their games at home in the Premier League this term, scoring seven goals and only conceding twice. 

They also have a great record against Arteta’s former side at the Emirates under his tenure, winning four of the last five clashes between the teams in North London.

Everton have conceded 2+ goals in both of their matches since the international break against Hull and Chelsea, also notably failing to win any of their three away matches this term.

Barnsley are in a real mess at the moment.

They’ve lost each of their last five matches ahead of this one, and you have to go all the way back to early September for their last win in any competition - a 2-1 victory over Blackpool.

Reading boast the best home record of any side in League One, with only Luton managing to beat them in front of their own fans back on Matchday 1.

Reading have scored 15 goals across their six home games in League One this term (2.5 per game), which is more than any other side at home in the third division.

Barnsley have only managed to win one of their five away games in League One this season, losing three of these games. Reading’s scoring power is likely to be too much for them, Barnsley have only scored five goals across these matches. 

These are two of the best sides in the Championship, and I think Southampton have shown enough this season to back them to get on the scoresheet.

Tonda Eckert’s side have netted 21 goals across their 11 games in the Championship this season (1.90 per game), only Middlesbrough (22) and West Ham (30) have scored more goals than Southampton in the Championship this season.

The only side that has managed to keep Southampton out so far this season was Bolton last week, who were quite fortunate to keep that clean sheet with the Saints registering an xG of 2.19 from their 14 shots.

These sides faced off in the EFL Cup earlier in the season, which saw West Ham come away 4-1 winners. Southampton rotated heavily for that game, and still managed to get on the scoresheet.

This is usually one of the most entertaining games of the Premier League season with the most recent meeting producing three goals as Chelsea came away 2-1 winners over Tottenham at Stamford Bridge.

Chelsea have seen 3+ goals in six of their last seven Premier League matches this season. They did look a little more settled against Everton last time out, securing a 2-0 victory, but Tottenham should be able to capitalise more on Chelsea’s defensive issues than the Toffees.

De Zerbi’s side got their first win of the season against Coventry last time out, coming away 3-1 winners. They’ve seen 16 goals across their seven Premier League matches this season (2.28 per game), and have only kept one more clean sheet than Chelsea (2).