Sunday's Bet Of The Day: Cards are king in the capital

JACK Wright's (@JackWright_BSB) brilliant Bet of the Day continues on Sunday as we head to the Premier League.

Tottenham vs Sheffield United | Sunday 2^nd May 2021, 19:15 | Sky Sports

Tottenham will be looking to bounce back from a disappointing performance and result in last weekend's League Cup final by securing consecutive league victories in the first two EPL fixtures since Jose Mourinho’s departure – they could wish for no better opponents than already relegated Sheffield United.

Despite earning a first win in seven games with victory over Brighton at Bramall Lane last weekend, the Blades are on a six-game losing run on the road, failing to score in 5 of them.

Only scoring twice in Paul Heckingbottom’s six game reign, whilst conceding 13 it is clear not much has changed since parting with Chris Wilder and we should expect Spurs to dominate this fixture – with only Newcastle (41.9%) and West Brom (41%) seeing less of the ball this season than the Yorkshire outfit.

With Ryan Mason looking to galvanise his side for a final push at trying to secure a top four finish, whilst attempting to impress the decision makers at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium the pressure will be on the visitors to keep the likes of Harry Kane, Son Heung-Min and Gareth Bale quiet be that by fair means or (hopefully) foul.

One area where Sheffield United have remained consistent is their ability to pick up cards, especially on the road, where they have collected more booking points than the home side in 15 of their 16 road trips (93%), ironically the only league game in which they didn’t was their only away win this term – at Old Trafford.

Their overall record has seen them pick up more booking points than their opponents in 24 of their 33 EPL games played so far (73%) and in all of their last six away games, in contrast Spurs have only had more booking points than their opponents in seven league games (21%) with only Manchester City achieving less.

At home the North London side have only had more booking points than the visitors in two of the ten games played and in only one of the last five.

In Andre Marriner we don’t have the best official for cards, but he doesn’t need to be, showing 55 yellow cards and one red from his 22 EPL appointments he has an average of 26.14 booking points across the season.

Saying that the 50-year-old whistle blower from West Midlands issued the Blades four yellow cards the last time he was in charge of one of their games – which just so happened to be in the reverse fixture at Bramall Lane in January – failing to show Spurs any.

With Marriner being one of the more lenient EPL referees I am put off backing 20+ Sheffield United booking points (11/10 Sky Bet), despite their position as the side with the highest number of cards received (63 yellow, 3 red) and I can’t overlook the stats they have built for most booking points, so that gets today’s vote as Bet of the Day at odds of 5/6 with Sky Bet.