Jones’ Top Bets: Man City, Arsenal, and Liverpool to Score First-Half Goals

Alexander Isak, see me in my office. The Newcastle striker’s failure to score for Newcastle at Fulham meant both bets last weekend went into the Sky Bet satchels.

All eggs were in his basket and it proved a foolish move on my part. The both teams to score and over 2.5 goals in Tottenham and Nottingham Forest landed – as did Axel Disasi to make a foul vs Sheffield United but no Isak, no party in terms of the 13/2 treble.

His failure to trouble the scorers also meant the Isak to score twice punt at 10/1 went tumbling into the abyss. Two points lost.

And lessons learned, you’d assume. Or not.

I’m keeping the faith with Isak. Time to repay that faith, Alexander.

This bet lands if Man City, Arsenal and Liverpool score six or more first-half goals between them this weekend against teams they are 1/12, 1/5 and 1/5 to win this weekend. This bet gets me excited for many reasons.

Not only is it a great one from an entertainment perspective as it will have some sort of chance of landing heading into the Arsenal game at 4.30pm on Sunday, but we’re also playing a line that looks very attractive to me. All three teams are in a busy spell with big European matches on the horizon in midweek, especially Arsenal and Manchester City.

I think there’s a strong chance of both managers wanting their side to rack up a comfortable lead in the first 45 minutes against Aston Villa and Luton to save some legs for midweek. It could lead to dull second halves, like Arsenal produced in their 2-0 win over Luton recently.

And Liverpool will surely be in reaction mode after what happened on Thursday night. Crystal Palace could feel that force in the first half.

Spurs (81%) and Newcastle (71%) sit first and third when it comes to percentage of their Premier League games going over 2.5 goals so a goals-based bet has to be considered. Isak is that play.

He’s scored 10 goals in his last 14 appearances and Isak’s goals per 90 rate is the fourth best of any player in the Premier League at 0.70. In a goal-heavy game, he can get in on the act.

We’re dealing with two of the worst attacks in the Premier League since December when Burnley and Brighton met. If you take out matches against Sheffield United since December, Burnley have scored 17 goals in 18 matches – 0.94 goals per game whilst if you remove Sheffield United from the equation again, Brighton have scored just 13 goals in their last 15 games across all competitions.

Under 2.5 has to be the play at the prices. Any opportunity we get to back both teams to score around Evens should be gobbled up this season in the Premier League.

It’s a bet that has landed in 62.9 per cent of games – a huge increase on the average from the last five seasons of 50.66 as the goal rush in this league continues to flow at never-before-seen levels. Well, the price for it to land in Liverpool vs Crystal Palace is 5/6 and it looks a confident selection to hopefully bring home the treble on *Super Sunday*.