Premier League, Championship, League One & Two Betting Tips – Winners and Relegation
The Premier League is the most watched domestic football division in the world. It’s often a source of annoyance for those of us that live in the country it’s played in that we need to take out a host of subscriptions in order to watch matches at home, whilst those that live in the likes of the Middle East and America can watch any game they want without an issue. Yet that is also part of what makes the English top-flight so beloved around the world – its accessibility. The adverts from the likes of Sky Sports that make out as if every single game is stunningly exciting are obviously selling us a dream that will never be a reality, with Burnley versus Cardiff City hardly likely to make an all-time best of DVD. That said, even the dullest of games can still have a huge impact at both ends of the table.
That’s what makes the Premier League the complete package – the ability of lower level teams to constantly bloody the nose of those at the top of the division and potentially cause an upset. It’s also what makes it so very hard to predict, with many punters desperate for even the vaguest idea of how things might pan out over the course of a season. It’s also why transfer dealings remain so high on the list of priorities for some supporters, feeling that the best chance that their team has got of winning anything revolves around new faces rather than the training of old ones. This piece can’t take all of the transfer dealings of teams into account, but it will still attempt to look at the obvious candidates for the various happenings in the 2018-2019 campaign.
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2018-19 Premier League Champions
Manchester City broke all sorts of records on their way to winning the title in 2017-2018. They won the most games any team has managed since the Premier League was formed in 1992, they racked up the most points of any side at one hundred and they also achieved the largest winning margin that the Premier League has seen. Little wonder, then, that Pep Guardiola’s side is the strong favourite for back-to-back titles. If they manage it, it will be the first time that it’s happened since their city rivals Manchester United won three-in-a-row between 2006 and 2009. Is that something worth bearing in mind?
The strongest challengers to City’s dominate might well be Liverpool, how finished top four and made it to the Champions League final last season. On the one hand that might seem silly, given that they ended the campaign twenty-five points behind the Cityzens in 2017-2018. Yet on the other hand, they beat Guardiola’s side in the league and then again in Europe, only finishing six points behind their old foe United because they turned their attentions to the European Cup towards the end of the season and drew with West Brom, Everton and Stoke. Jürgen Klopp seems to be hitting his stride in the Premier League now and he’s also done well in the transfer market, meaning that 2018-2019 might finally be Liverpool’s year.
Their biggest rivals, Manchester United, might well have something to say about that. It’s widely accepted that they played pretty poor football last season, yet they finished second and notched up a points score that would have been respectable any other season. José Mourinho is a born winner, having won three Premier League titles with Chelsea, the Primeira Liga with Porto and domestic titles in Spain and Italy, as well as two Champions Leagues and countless other trophies. You’d be daft to write-off the Red Devils even without the Portuguese superstar in the dugout. There are some question marks that beed to be answered, such as the fact that the wheels usually come off in his third season at a club, but generally speaking there’s no way you should be ignoring the team that’s won the Premier League more than any other side heading into any season.
Champions:
Manchester City – 4/7
Champions League Places
If there’s a lack of excitement over the favourites for the title then the same definitely can’t be said for the race for the top four. Apart from City, no team is guaranteed a place in the Champions League spots heading into 2018-2019. Liverpool and Manchester United might be on the list as potential title-rivals to Pep Guardiola’s team, but it could just as easily happen that one of them implodes and drops down to sixth or seventh. It might not even take an implosion, given the strength of teams that could also fight for a place in Europe’s elite competition for the 2019-2020 campaign.
Arsenal’s decision to finally say thank you and goodbye to Arsene Wenger means that the Gunners are in a thrilling position heading into the season. Unai Emery might not have been the most thrilling of replacements for the Frenchman, but he’s not without experience. He won the Europa League for three consecutive seasons between 2013 and 2016, with the final trophy coming at the expense of a manager and team that he’ll now be going head-to-head with: Jürgen Klopp and Liverpool. He’s also arriving on the back of winning Ligue 1 with PSG, so he’ll fancy his chances of restoring Arsenal to their former glories. There are plenty of holes in the squad, however, to say nothing of disquiet at The Emirates; you feel that it won’t take much for supporters to get on his back if he doesn’t hit the ground running.
The cracks have started to show at Tottenham Hotspur recently, including the rather lukewarm declaration of loyalty declared by Mauricio Pochettino in the wake of interest in his signature from Real Madrid. In the end Los Blancos looked elsewhere, but the fact that the Argentine’s head was turned at all might mean that Spurs begin to fracture if things don’t go well this season. They signed both the manager and star player in Harry Kane to new contracts not long ago, but there’s been problems with the likes of Toby Alderweireld and everyone knows contracts are barely worth the paper they’re written on. Given how strong Spurs have been in recent seasons, they’ll have to win something eventually if they want to keep everyone happy. This season depends mostly on how well they settle into the new White Hart Lane, due to open in September 2018.
Of all of the top clubs in the Premier League, what’s going on at Chelsea seems to be the most intriguing. You’d be forgiven for thinking that everything is hunky-dory, considering the Blues have won two out of the last four titles. Yet there have been signs in recent times that the club’s Russian owner, Roman Abramovich, has been getting bored of his plaything. That’s culminated in his decision recently to abandon plans to redevelop Stamford Bridge on account of the British government’s decision not to renew his visa. That, combined with transfers from the lower shelves in recent times means that many think he might look to sell up soon. Add to the problems with the owner the fact that the manager is disliked by a score of his players and might well be sacked by the time you’re reading this and you can see why they’re not high on the list of favourites.
Top Four Prediction:
Manchester City (1/16)
Liverpool (1/4)
Manchester United (2/7)
Arsenal (2/1)
Relegation Battle
In all but two of the Premier League campaigns between 2006 and 2018, at least one team that was promoted from the Championship the season before has been relegated straight back down. Only 2011-2012 and 2017-2018 saw all three promoted teams remain in the division. That said, not one season during that same period saw all three teams that had made it into the top-flight together head straight back down. In other words, it’s often teams that you least expect that struggle to stay in the world’s most lucrative division. Wolverhampton Wanderers, Fulham and Cardiff City are the three sides that made it out of the Championship at the end of 2017-2018, so how many of them are likely to stick around for more than one campaign?
A lot of that will depend on how well the other sides towards the bottom of the table are able to cope. Huddersfield Town must be looking at last season and wondering how on earth they did it. Having spent one of the lowest amounts of money on players, many expected the Terriers to struggle for survival. It was only due to the exceptional work of David Wagner as manager that they were able to stay in the Premier League, so it’s hardly surprising that they offered him a new contract this summer. The big question now is, will they be bolstered by their survival, or did they expend all of their energy last season and won’t have quite enough to cope this time around? Having been grateful simply to stay up, will Huddersfield supporters be just as forgiving if they don’t up their game?
Brighton & Hove Albion’s are another team that did better than anyone expected. Chris Hughton’s done a brilliant job with the Seasiders, perhaps putting himself in a situation where another club might come calling for him if they need someone who plays attractive football but gets results. The fixtures don’t look as friendly as the manager would have wanted, pitting them against potential relegation rivals in Newcastle and Wolves before playing Arsenal and Manchester City in their last four games. If they’re not safe before the last month of the campaign then expect a few people to get very nervous indeed.
The one good thing for clubs that might struggle in 2018-2019 is that there are genuinely a number of relegation candidates on the list. The likes of Bournemouth, Watford and West Ham United have all been toying with going down in recent years, whilst teams such as Southampton can’t keep on selling all of their best players and surviving. They managed to escape from the relegation zone towards the end 2017-2018 but it was touch and go for a while. In the end it came down to the last day for Saints, which will have been closer than Mark Hughes would’ve liked. Then there’s the likes of Burnley and Leicester City, who have done far better than anyone would’ve imagined since their promotion to the top-flight in 2014 – the Foxes won the league, for goodness sake – but there’s an argument that they’re not strong enough to be complacent about their Premier League status.
Relegation Prediction:
Fulham (6/4)
Huddersfield Town (6/5)
Cardiff City (8/11)
Outside Bets For The 2018/19 Season
Since the Premier League began in 1992, a number of surprise clubs have broken into the top four. The most obvious example is Leicester City, who took the world by surprise when they won the title back in 2016. It’s not totally out of the question, therefore, that a side might come from nowhere to upset the apple cart.
Burnley had a brilliant campaign in 2017-2018, for example, ending up seventh. Yet if there’s a team that has the potential to put together a run of performances good enough to cause problems then it’s surely Newcastle United. A lot of it will depend on how much the cub’s owner, Mike Ashley, is willing to back the manager. Rafa Benitez won the Champions League with Liverpool in 2005 with a squad of misfits, so who would bet against him getting the Magpies to over-perform if he’s given the tools to do so? It’s a big ‘if’, though.
Newcastle Top Four Finish: 66/1
As always, it’s fun to speculate on a big team struggling, if for no other reason than you’ll get decent odds. One of the sides that will be hoping the start to their last campaign was just an anomaly is Everton, with the Blues sacking Ronald Koeman and bringing in Sam Allardyce to help them get out of relegation trouble. They’ll be confident that that was a scare enough to put them on the right track and that their decision to bring in Marco Silva will put them back in the mix at the right end of the table.
Yet Silva was relegated with Hull City and was sacked by Watford after having his head turned by Everton last season, so there’s no guarantee that they’ll be fighting for European places. The club’s major shareholder, Farhad Moshiri, was essentially an accountant at Arsenal before buying into the Goodison club, so he’s not someone who knows football inside out. If you want an outside punt on a relegation candidate then Everton might be worth considering.
Everton To Be Relegated: 33/1
2018-19 Championship Betting Tips
The Premier League isn’t the only division that people like to bet on, of course. Aside from anything else, some people like to try to predict which teams will be promoted into the top-flight at the end of each season. So which teams are most likely to win the league, reach the play-offs and face relegation in 2018-2019?
Having just missed out on promotion through the play-offs last season, Aston Villa will fancy their chances. The club has been in financial trouble, however, so the newly relegated teams such as Stoke City and Swansea will feel they’ve got better squads. Meanwhile, the newly promoted teams like Wigan, Rotherham and Blackburn will be wondering if they’ve got enough to keep themselves up.
Winners:
West Brom (8/1)
Outside Winner:
Nottingham Forest (20/1)
Promotion:
Stoke (5/2)
Middlesborough (3/1)
Relegation:
Rotherham United (11/8)
Ipswich (9/4)
Blackburn (5/1)
Outside Relegation:
Sheffield Wednesday (14/1)
2018-19 League One Betting Tips
The Premier League is the most watched division in the world, with the Championship being one of the most popular second-tier leagues in Europe. By the time you get to League One, however, the popularity has started to wane. As a result, you’d be forgiven for not being entirely sure who you should be placing your bets on.
There are a few teams that fans of the top-flight might well recognise, with Blackpool and Sunderland being amongst the favourites to gain promotion. It’s a competitive league, though, so don’t think that there’s likely to be a runaway winner. When it comes to the relegation candidates, the likes of Accrington Stanley and Wycombe Wanderers will be keen to avoid heading straight back down to League Two.
Winners:
Sunderland (3/1)
Outside Winner:
Peterborough United (16/1)
Promotion:
Barnsley (8/1)
Portsmouth (14/1)
Relegation:
Accrington Stanley (5/4)
Wycombe Wanderers (11/8),
AFC Wimbledon (5/2)
Outside Relegation:
Plymouth (7/1)
2018-19 League Two Betting Tips
When it comes to looking at League Two, there are a number of factors that you need to bear in mind. For starters, the atmosphere is likely to be less influential on account of the fact that crowds tend to be much lower at the foot of the Football League. There’s also the fact that there’s an interesting mix of teams, including those that have strived hard to escape the non-league and those that struggled in League One.
In terms of who you can look towards to win the division, those that have only just dropped into it might be the best place to start. Milton Keynes Dons and Bury will be hoping that their experience will be enough to see them through. In terms of relegation, it’s worth bearing in mind that no club has come up one season and gone down the next since 2006, so you can probably be quite happy to steer clear of both Tranmere Rovers and Macclesfield Town.
