Bookings Tips | Espanyol v Barcelona | 2nd January 2016

GAVIN Murphy (@GamePlanGavin) reckons he's on to some serious value as he kicks off his 2016 betting for us.

Espanyol v Barcelona | Saturday 15:00

All eyes are on Catalunya this Saturday afternoon as the Barcelona derby takes centre stage. Frankly, I cannot believe this price. Spain's dirtiest team, Espanyol host Spain's most disciplined outfit, Barcelona at the Power8 stadium.

The hosts average 3.82 cards per game whereas their more illustrious neighbours only collect 1.6 on average.

The whisteblower is Jose Luis Gonzalez Gonzalez. He averages 6.11 cards per game. The bookies have chalked this up as under/over 7.5 cards. That is typical for a Spanish derby.

What I cannot understand though is William Hill offering 8/11 on Espanyol collecting over 3 cards. Given the stats, it should surely be way odds on as of the two teams, the hosts are far more likely to collect cards.

I recommended Espanyol to collect over three cards last time out in a mundane 2-0 loss at Sevilla. They had exactly three that day and so we were a tad unfortunate. Perhaps they had one eye on this fixture?

In the past three encounters, Espanyol have collected 8-4-6 cards so they have form. The eight came in the corresponding fixture last term as things boiled over in the second half.

Generally, Barcelona are too good for them and they get the hump. Something similar is expected this weekend and in front of their own fans they will surely put up more of a fight than they did at Sevilla.

Espanyol have three players in the top 20 most carded players in La Liga. Enzo Roco, captain Victor Sanchez and Pape Diop (who should be back from suspension for this showdown).

This looks as good a bet as I've seen for a while. I'm getting stuck into over 3 cards for Espanyol (so 4+ to win) at 8/11 with William Hill.