THERE’S Monday night La Liga action to enjoy tonight and Mark O’Haire (@MarkOHaire) hunts down the best bets from the Rayo Vallecano-Eibar meeting.
Rayo Vallecano v Eibar | Monday 19.45 | Sky Sports 5
Despite a rotten performance at Malaga last time out, Rayo Vallecano appear to have hit their stride in recent weeks. The Madrid-based club have secured three wins in their last five outings and started to play some of the attractive football that won them so many plaudits last season.
Paco Jemez’s side do their best work against teams of similar ability. This season, the hosts have collected 10 of their 11 points against teams below them in the Primera standings and scored nine of their 11 goals against the same opponents.
Having bagged 18/42 (43%) wins on home soil under Jemez’s watch, BetVictor’s 21/20 on a Rayo win appeals but plucky Eibar’s penchant for stalemates 4/9 (44%) puts me off a punt in the match prices.
Instead, we should be looking to focus on the goal markets. Rayo have now seen 28/42 (67%) of fixtures at Vallecas under Jemez feature Over 2.5 Goals with 19/42 (45%) seeing Both Teams To Score. And only Atletico Madrid and Barcelona have shut out the hosts in 2014/15 in their own backyard.
Eibar boasted Segunda’s best defence last season but Gaizka Garitano's outfit have kept just three clean sheets since promotion. However, that stat can be countered by the fact the visitors have scored in six of their nine matches in league fixtures.
Both Teams To Score (11/10 Betfair) and Over 2.5 Goals (7/5 Betfair) hold plenty of appeal. The markets appear to have overreacted to Eibar’s low-scoring matches at the start of the season, so we’ll take a punt on BTTS and also have a small play on the home side with Both Teams To Score at a chunky 21/5 with Coral.
Best Bets
Rayo Vallecano v Eibar – Both Teams To Score (11/10 Betfair)
Rayo Vallecano v Eibar – Rayo + Both Teams To Score (21/5 Coral)
