Everton vs Leicester Betting Preview & Tips

EVERTON host Leicester on Wednesday night in the Premier League. Daniel McCulloch (@DMcCulloch1984) shares his favourite fancies.

Everton vs Leicester | Wednesday 27th January 2021, 20:15 | BT Sport

An intriguing game takes place at Goodison Park on Wednesday night, with two sides that are certainly in the hunt for a Champions League spot face off.

Both these sides seem to be in better positions than their underlying performance data suggests, with Everton seemingly earning 10 more points than they have merited, while Leicester’s league position has surely been benefited by the league high tally of penalties (10).

Leicester are actually marginal favourites for this encounter, despite the fact that their talisman Jamie Vardy is out with injury. The Foxes have actually looked less reliant on him in recent weeks though, aided by James Maddison and Harvey Barnes both managing half a dozen league goals this term.

Barnes has had 39 shots this season, placing him 16^th among all players this term, while he has six goals in 18 appearances, including three in his last five. The 17/5 Betfred are offering on the former West Brom loanee to score is a standout price and one that I recommend taking.

Six of Everton’s last eight matches have seen two goals or fewer and with Leicester also missing Vardy, I did consider the under 2.5 goals angle. However, 4/5 seems a little skinny to me. Instead, I will factor in the referee when making my second bet.

Mike Dean is often your go to man when it comes to bookings and I did consider both Jonny Evans and Lucas Digne in that market. However, it is the goals angle I will look to once again as I noticed that he has been underperforming slightly in terms of penalties awarded this season.

Surprisingly he has awarded just four penalties in 12 league games this season, the average per game down ever so slightly (0.33 per game vs 0.34 lifetime) on his career which is surprising given how the volume has increased generally since the introduction of VAR.

I do, however, think the stats this season are simply due to variance and expect Mike to get his numbers up. With that in mind, I like Youri Tielemans at 5/1 with Paddy Power to also find the net.

Leicester are the penalty kings this season and with Vardy out, he will be on duties and is also a threat from open play. 5/1 looks a very attractive price to me. I did consider just backing both in the first goalscorer market as I do not expect lots of goals, but will air on the safe side here.