AFTER another excellent weekend Gavin Murphy (@GamePlanGavin) returns with Monday night bookings bets.
Athletic Bilbao v Sporting Gijon | Monday 19:30 | Sky Sports 5
Spain's most prolific card issuer takes to the field on Monday night. No, I'm not talking about Senor Confetti but his twin brother, Senor Moonpig. Ok, jokes and nicknames aside, Ignacio Villanueva has some remarkable stats.
He averages 8.8 cards per game. Just think about that for a second…truly amazing. Of course, that figure is slightly inflated by the 15 he dished out last week when we tipped the over 6 in the Real Sociedad v Atletico Madrid match.
As a wider pattern, he gives 6-7 per game but when he loses it he REALLY loses it and ends up giving out 10+. He has done that twice in past three weeks and that inflates his average.
In terms of this tussle Sporting Gijon, another team we benefited from last week from a cards perspective, travel to the Basque country to take on Athletic Bilbao. The new San Mames stadium is undoubtedly one of Spain's more intimidating venues.
Bilbao average 2.38 cards per game this season and Sporting 3.13. Admittedly some time ago but the last three encounters between these two teams in Bilbao had six, eight and seven cards in them.
Under/over 7.5 cards has been bet365's opening line and that's been pretty solid all week. Unders is 4/6, despite this ref. I would love to tip over but I can't. Only 8/20 with this ref would have gone over 7.5. Only 3/10 would have gone over.
Over 7.5 is 0/4 in Bilbao home games and just 1/4 in Gijon away games. Very poor stats for anyone looking to go over but you are a brave man to go under with this official as previously mentioned. You never know with this referee as he can lose the plot but 7.5 (so 8 to win) seems too high so I'm looking at other markets.
As the line is so high the “time of first card market” has been pushed lower. That is based on probability but ignores the fact that most cards come in the second half of matches.
This ref, on average dishes out his first card on 29 minutes this season. Therefore the 5/6 on “no card before 22 minutes” with Bet365 looks value and is worth a small punt. This bet would have won in 6/9 Spanish games this weekend.
In my view, another decent bet is the second half cards. In the past ten games with this ref 70% have had four or more cards in the second half in them. Bilbao have 68% of theirs after halftime (so 1.62) and Sporting 72% (so 2.25). That gives 3.87 in total.
I expect it to go very close and I'm getting stuck into over 3 second half cards at 5/6 with William Hill.
Cardiff City v Bristol City | Monday 19:45 | Sky Sports 1
I'm a Cardiff boy born and bred and this is our second (relatively) local derby after Swansea. This wasn't a match that interested me initially until I saw the stats.
In the past three encounters at Cardiff the cards read one, two and three. The previous two home and away have had just one card in each game. Perhaps this isn't quite the hostile derby it is sometimes portrayed as?
The FA take no chances and often put a Premier League official in charge. Michael Oliver and Stuart Atwell have both controlled this fixture recently. Tonight another top flight whisteblower, Craig Pawson gets a crack. In his last four games his cards read three, two, three, two.
Under 45pts at 6/10 looks a steal with William Hill given the stats and I'm getting involved.
Best Bets
Athletic Bilbao v Sporting Gijon – No Card Before 22 Minutes (5/6 Bet365)
Athletic Bilbao v Sporting Gijon – Over 3 Second Half Cards (5/6 William Hill)
Cardiff City v Bristol City – Under 45 Booking Points (6/10 William Hill)
