BOOKINGS boff Gavin Murphy (@GamePlanGavin) has earmarked Tuesday’s Champions League tie from Munich for cards.
Bayern Munich v Atletico Madrid | Tuesday 19.45 | BT Sport Europe
Champions League semi-final second leg action returns on Tuesday night as hosts Bayern Munich look to avoid losing to a Spanish side for the third year running at this stage of the competition.
Atletico Madrid are the latest opponent and they will be determined to protect their 1-0 first leg advantage picked up at the Vicente Calderon last week.
By all accounts, Diego Godin and Felipe Luis are expected to be fit for the guests and that's good news for cards backers, like us.
The second leg matches in recent seasons have been surprisingly low in terms of cards – the past six have produced total card figures of 4-7-3-2-2-3-7.
Turkish ref Cuneyt Cakir is in charge and the bookies are pricing this up as Under/Over 5.5 Cards with overs being slightly favoured. To be honest, there is little evidence around as Cakir has only refereed Bayern on three previous occasions and has never covered Atletico.
There were five cards dished out by Mark Clattenburg in the first leg with Bayern, the away team, collecting four.
Rather than back the Total Cards – where the recent trends are mixed – I'm going to recommend a different angle. If 6+ cards are given, it is reasonable to expect Atletico will collect the most as they have a lead to protect and are the away team.
Looking at his career stats, Cakir has often given more cards to the away team. Most bookies also have Atletico at -1 in the handicap bookings market and so expect the Mattress Makers to be the busiest in the card department.
Therefore, I'm backing Over 3 Atletico Madrid Cards at 21/20 (William Hill)
Best Bets
Bayern Munich v Atletico Madrid – Atletico Madrid to receive Over 3 Cards (21/20 William Hill)
