NON-LEAGUE expert Paul Maddison (@LouthBigDog) shares his favourite fancies from a Saturday card of National League action.
There's not quite a full compliment of fixtures for the National League this weekend due to the quarter finals of the FA Trophy. I won't be backing them, but I will be hoping Wealdstone can beat Billericay in their tie. Billericay's owner/manager/egotistical maniac, Glenn Tamplin has said if they lose this game he will sack himself as manager, whether this is true or not, or he hadn't been in the papers for 24 hours so had to make some story up to get back in the limelight, I don't know.
I have managed to find a couple of goal based bets that I really like the look off though. Was a bit nervous when I listened to the ever excellent Two Marks feature on this site as there was a question in there about goal based bets at this stage in the season. However the answers they gave have strengthened my opinion on the bets I've picked.
Macclesfield v Maidenhead | Saturday 24th February 2018, 15:00
First off I head to league leaders Macclesfield, who had an excellent week last week, just as I thought their title challenge was going to start to unravel. They had two top of the table clashes (1st vs 2nd in both games) and came out of that with 6 points to cement their place as league leaders by 5 points.
The Silkmen are in good form in front of goal, scoring 8 in their last 3, including 4 in a great win away at Tranmere on Tuesday night, although manager John Askey did say they could have been 3-0 down at the break. They've not been so good at the other end of the pitch though and have conceded in their last 6 games, including shipping 6 against Flyde. 4 of their last 5 matches have seen 3 or more goals, with an average of just under 4 goals per game in those 5 games.
There always seem to be plenty of goals when Maidenhead play, 9 of their last 11 in all competitions have seen both teams score and 9 of them have also gone over 2.5 goals. Their last 5 league games have all gone over 2.5 as well, averaging just under 4 goals per game.
Over 2.5 goals is available at 19/20 with MarathonBet and that looks generous to me.
Sutton Utd v Guiseley | Saturday 24th February 2018, 15:00
Both these teams will be desperate for a win here, for different reasons. Surprisingly to pretty much everyone, Sutton are having an amazing season and sit 2nd in the league. You would think that maybe the perceived advantage of playing their home games on a 3G pitch would help massively. In truth they haven't been that great at home and sit 13th in the ‘home table'. They've actually picked up plenty more points away from home.
Sutton have conceded in 5 of their last 6 games, including 3 against lower league Brackley and 2 against a struggling Torquay team. They've conceded 21 goals in 16 home matches so far this season in the league, only 8 team have worse defensive records at home in the league, which is a surprise for a team sitting 2nd in the league
Guiseley have MASSIVE task to stay in this league, but they beat a decent Flyde team in midweek and it was about this stage last season that they made their great escape putting together an excellent run of form. They have had some tricky away fixtures recently but have scored in 6 of their last 7, whilst playing 4 of the top 8 in the league in that period. They added fire power in January in the form of Dayle Southwell from Wycombe who made a great start there before injury problems meant he had limited chances.
Guiseley have however got the worst record for goals conceded in the league so I'm in no doubt a strong Sutton side will find the net at least once.
You can get 21/20 at MarathonBet on Both Teams to Score here and that looks the bet to me.
Best Bets
Macclesfield v Maidenhead – Over 2.5 Goals (19/20 Marathonbet)
Sutton Utd v Guiseley – Both Teams To Score (21/20 Marathonbet)
