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Leeds v Sheffield United
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Kick Off: Friday 18th October at 20:00
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Competition: Championship
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Watch Live: Sky Sports Main Event
Leeds United and Sheffield United, the top two current favourites to win the EFL Championship title, meet in a high-stakes Yorkshire derby. Leeds are pushing to break into the automatic promotion spots, while Sheffield United, currently in second, look to solidify their position.
With both teams in strong contention for the Championship crown, this match could play a pivotal role in shaping the title race, as they each vie to maintain their promotion momentum.
⭐ Leeds v Sheffield United Best Bets
Looking back through Leeds’ recent history of big matches at Elland Road under Daniel Farke, they have a strong record. They beat promoted teams Leicester and Ipswich comfortably, 3-1 and 4-0 respectively last season, as well as beating Norwich in the play-offs 4-0 as well.
Sheffield United will perhaps not come out and play as much as those teams did, it is still an impressive set of results in the big matches, and Daniel Farke seems to be able to get his team to perform well in the bigger matches at Elland Road.
Therefore, siding with Leeds looks to be a good option, and though the straight win option is odds on at 1.67 it is also the option that is less fraught with danger.
Another price-based recommendation is for Jesurun Rak-Sakyi to score anytime at 7.0. He scored twice just before the international break and actually averages a higher xG per match than Gus Hamer who is much shorter in the betting.
👕 Leeds v Sheffield United Predicted XI
🔍 Leeds v Sheffield United Players to Watch
⚪ Junior Firpo
Firpo has established himself as a key player for Leeds this season, playing the vast majority of minutes and remaining fit. He has committed at least one foul in every match this season, going back further, this run of committing at least one foul stretches to 24 of his last 28 starts. He has hit the two foul mark in three of his last four matches, and sinned three times against Sunderland last time out.
⚪️ Largie Ramazani
The new Leeds winger has started really positively with 11 shots in his four starts, four last time out against Sunderland, two against Norwich, two against Coventry, and three against Cardiff. He did fail to hit the target against Sunderland, whereas he had done so at least once in each of the previous three matches, and he has chipped in with two goals from 1.43 xG, he looks one to watch for shots and goals.
🔴 Gustavo Hamer
Hamer always seems to be at the centre of matches for the Blades. He is averaging 2.3 shots per 90 over Sheffield United’s last 30 matches, but that raises to 3.65 when just looking at this season in the Championship. This run includes six shots at home to Watford, and five in each of QPR (H), Derby (H), and Portsmouth (A). He has also committed at least one foul in each of his last five starts.
📂 Leeds v Sheffield United Cheat Sheet
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We have shots on target predictions, both teams to score acca tips, card betting tips and fouls betting predictions at your fingertips this weekend. If that’s not enough, check out our Saturday early kick-off acca and 100/1 mega acca tips too.
💻 Leeds v Sheffield United Form and Tactics
Leeds are dominant in the Championship when it comes to performance data. They lead the metrics in possession and shots on target, and are second for xG for and xG against. Whilst this has not lead to domination in terms of results, Leeds have only lost to Burnley so far this season, and that was slightly against the run of play.
The difficulty that Leeds have had come across is turning their performance into wins, they have drawn four of their nine league matches, and in two of those Leeds have been the dominant force in the match. Farke has Leeds playing in a 4-2-3-1 formation, which is very familiar from last season, and also from Farke’s successful Championship seasons with Norwich.
Chris Wilder has achieved promotion from this league with Sheffield United before, but this tactical system is very different. Gone is the 3 man defence, replaced by a back four with, usually, two central midfielders in front of them. T
he three attacking midfielders in behind the lone forward are usually a bit imbalanced, Andre Brooks and Jesurun Rak-Sakyi have been sharing the minutes playing wide on the right, but Harrison Burrows tends to provide the width on the left from left-back, allowing Gus Hamer and Callum O’Hare to combine in the left half-space.
The system has clearly been effective as the Blades have the best set of results in the league. No goal has been conceded for six Championship matches now, since Norwich scored on 24th August. It is, therefore, little surprise to see that Sheffield United are the best in xGA in the league.
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🏁 Leeds v Sheffield United Ref Watch
- Lewis Smith is a fairly inexperienced referee at Championship level, this will be only his 14th match refereeing in the second tier, albeit he has also refereed three Premier League matches, and, interestingly, three matches in Japan in March 2024.
- Smith has refereed at Elland Road before though, in the FA Cup fourth round last season, just one yellow card was produced in that match against Plymouth.
- He averages 21.65 fouls given per match, which is relatively low in comparison to his peers, and he averages 3.73 yellow cards per match.
- This yellow card average is lower at 3.45 over his 11 matches this season, this includes six yellows across three Championship matches in 24/25.
Football Predictions at Andy’s Bet Club
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Expert guides, such as this one, on xG in football, are also available to help you up your punting game.
* I recommend waiting for confirmed team line-ups before placing any bets.
* All odds displayed correct at the time of publishing.
Written by an Andy verified content writer
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