Free football betting tips: Saturday FA Cup televised games previewed, including Norwich v Chelsea

Football

Sat January 06, 2018 · 7y ago

David John runs the rule over Saturday afternoon's two televised FA Cup clashes, including Chelsea's trip to Norwich.

You can also click here for our unique 'FA Cup Shockometer' which lists all the weekend's fixtures in order of where we think the upsets could occur.

You can also find the team news for every FA Cup tie by clicking right here.

Fleetwood v Leicester (1245 GMT, BBC One)

Auntie Beeb threw their hat into the ring for this fixture considering the potential for a Premier League winner to go tumbling out at the first hurdle in the competition but also in the hope of seeing Jamie Vardy return to the club he left to join the Foxes back in 2012 for a £1m fee.

There is a fair chance Leicester manager Claude Puel could rest him but the striker himself has thrown a spanner in the works having picked up a groin injury that ruled him out of the recent 3-0 victory over Huddersfield.

Vardy has not trained during the week and been limited to exercise work in the gym so any happy homecoming seems odds-on to be kyboshed.

We will have to wait in terms of how Puel will play things overall in terms of team selection as he was happy enough to rest some of his big guns in the quarter-final of the Carabao Cup against Manchester City but there is enough quality at the second level to do a job if the attitude is right.

Andy King, Shinji Okazaki and Kelechi Iheanacho could all get the call while the classy Adrien Silva, who can at last turn out for his new team, should get some significant playing time - what he will make of the Lancashire coast in early January should be interesting.

The hosts picked up six points in League One from four games over Christmas, a good enough return for manager Uwe Rosler to give his players a couple of days off following New Year.

"I think the break will get them mentally hungry again for football. They gave me everything over Christmas," Rosler observed and that little bit of additional freshness will count for plenty at this stage of the season.

Things have been going well for Puel since his surprise appointment and he can avoid any awkward questions from this fixture going pear-shaped if he gives it routine care and attention.

The reliable King was involved in three of their four games in the competition last season before being dumped out by Millwall and he managed to score along the way in their replay success over Derby so is worth a dart to repeat the dose at almost 5/1.

Prediction: Fleetwood 1-3 Leicester - Sky Bet odds: 11/1

Norwich v Chelsea (1730 GMT, BT Sport 2)

Chelsea put an awful lot into their 2-2 draw at Arsenal in midweek and with little time for manager Antonio Conte to draw breath, this represents a ripe opportunity to give his squad players a spin at Carrow Road.

The Blues are immediately back in Carabao Cup action next Wednesday in a two-legged semi-final encounter against the Gunners yet again with a Wembley appearance on the line so something simply has to give following the frenzied festive period.

Chelsea were defeated by Arsenal in May’s FA Cup final but the desire to get back there at this point in the calendar is always a little bit tepid for the Premier League’s handful of top sides as they juggle various responsibilities.

Conte will give this fixture as much focus as possible but it is going to be down to the likes of Michy Batshuayi, Charley Musonda and rising star Ethan Ampadu to safely negotiate a tricky trip to East Anglia.

The hosts sit in mid-table of the Sky Bet Championship a couple of points behind arch-rivals Ipswich but do seem to have emerged from a decidedly iffy spell in the autumn following a battling, if ultimately unsuccessful, effort in the Carabao Cup at Arsenal.

Ten points from their last six league games has given manager Daniel Farke a little bit of time but there is certainly a feeling amongst some areas of the faithful that the German could already be on borrowed time.

A positive outcome here would certainly be a step in the right direction and their effort at the Emirates in October would suggest any potential replay in west London would not be approached with a great deal of trepidation.

This is not an overly-enticing match to punt on and a glance at the team-sheet an hour before kick-off will be the best time to weigh things up and strike with any wagers.

That said, I think Conte’s men will still have enough about them to get the job done and make it into the hat for the fourth round draw at the first time of asking.

Prediction: Norwich 0-2 Chelsea - Sky Bet odds: 13/2