Our first selection comes from a potential banana skin tie as West Ham travel to League One strugglers Burton. When there is a big disparity between squad quality, strikers for the underdogs are often left feeding on scraps and therefore end up making frustrated fouls.

Tyrese Shade looks to have a decent enough record to be that striker for us, with his record of 1.06 fouls per 90 across all competitions and 11 offences across his last eight starts.

West Ham may choose to rest players for this fixture; however, Shade is likely to be opposing any two from Max Kilman, Axel Disasi, and Konstantinos Mavorpanos, all of whom can mix it physically. Across the Hammers’ last six games, opposition strikers have committed eight fouls, and Shade seems to have the data to add more fouls to that list.

Centre back Taylor Harwood-Bellis has been prolific in the opposition box this season in terms of shots, averaging bang on one shot per 90 in Championship action. He’s been particularly shot-heavy at home, where he’s taken 11 in his last eight starts, including against Leicester, where he netted twice back in November.

The sides met in midweek and played out a seven-goal thriller (with Saints coming back from 3-0 down to win 4-3 in Leicester), another game where Harwood-Bellis got on the end of a set piece and where defensive partner Jack Stephens also netted from a corner.

The Foxes travel to St Mary’s with far bigger concerns than the FA Cup, as a points deduction has left them above the Championship drop zone on goal difference alone, and so they may well rest players for this game.

In any case, the visitors have given up the 5th-most set piece shots in the second tier this season at 4.66 per game, and so the aerially dominant Harwood-Bellis will fancy his chances again.

There were a total of 20 corners across the two league meetings between the sides this season, with exactly nine at Villa Park when the sides last met. This is a clash between two strong attacking units, and chances are likely to be available at both ends of the field once again. 

Aston Villa are averaging 5.23 corners per game across all competitions this season, rising to 5.7 when playing at Villa Park. They racked up 12 corners in their last home outing against Brentford, and they usually play with a lot more attacking intent in front of a home crowd. 

It is a similar story for Newcastle, who tend to take things up a gear when they play on Tyneside, but the Magpies are still averaging 5.4 corners per game on their travels, which is also impressive.

Liverpool v Brighton is usually an entertaining encounter with eight of the last nine head-to-head clashes seeing 3+ goals. The exception actually came the last time that the sides met, with Liverpool running out 2-0 winners on that occasion. That game should have produced more goals, with Brighton generating an xG of 1.90 from their 14 shots and a combined xG of 3.79 in the contest.

Pressure is steadily increasing on Fabian Hurzeler with Brighton coming into this clash having won just one of their last six matches across all competitions, with that triumph coming in the last round of the FA Cup as they beat Manchester United 2-1. There isn’t a massive amount of evidence from Brighton’s side in recent matches to suggest a high-scoring game here, but what does stand out is how many goals they see on the road in the Premier League.

Brighton have seen 34 goals across their 13 away matches in the Premier League this term (2.61 per game), notably conceding 20 goals across those matches. Liverpool have a promising recent record when it comes to goals, seeing 3+ goals in four of their last five matches across all competitions. The historical trend of goals between the sides should also come into play, with the potential for a really exciting cup clash.