Sky Bet Championship runners-up West Brom return to the Premier League by hosting Leicester on Sunday. Joe Townsend looks at the betting.
Recommended bets
1pt Matheus Pereira to have 1+ shot on target from outside the area at 5/4
1pt West Brom and Leicester to draw at 3/1
For details of advised bookmakers and each-way terms, visit our transparent tipping record
West Brom v Leicester
- Sunday 2pm BST kick-off on Sky Sports
- Match Odds: Home 11/4 | Draw 13/5 | Away 19/20
West Brom start life back in the Premier League after a two-season absence by hosting a Leicester side whose form tailed off in a similarly alarming fashion to the Baggies during the second half of 2019/20.
Albion won just three of their final 12 fixtures, and the Sky Bet Championship table from December 10, which takes in 26 matches, had Slaven Bilic's side ninth.
But by the skin of their teeth, they got away with it. Leicester though, didn't.
The Foxes won only six of their final 22 games, which ultimately cost them Champions League qualification. Had they won on the final day though, Brendan Rodgers' team would've snuck into the top four and like West Brom their season would've been rightly deemed a huge success, with little focus on their second-half collapse.
Oh the fine margins of football.
While clubs and fans understandably love to approach a new campaign with fresh optimism, a clean slate for 'sky's the limit' ambition, what has happened in the closing stages of the previous season is rarely brushed to one side.
Which makes Leicester's odds-on price in this game ridiculous quite frankly, even with their opponents' own problems. I won't shy away from the facts when it comes to newly-promoted teams, which goes someway to explaining the price.
In the past four Premier League seasons, only twice has a recent arrival from the Sky Bet Championship won on the opening weekend: two wins, three draws, seven defeats. Huddersfield's 3-0 win at Crystal Palace in 2017 was the most recent victory.
But Leicester have not won an away league game since New Year's Day, and despite their troubles, Bilic's side lost only three of their 23 home games last season, losing only one of their final nine and remaining unbeaten in their five behind-closed-doors clashes.
No club in the Sky Bet Championship drew more than West Brom's 17 matches last season, and when I can't bring myself to back either team to win, the draw is the smart play - especially at 3/1.
The BTTS draw at 15/4 is tempting, but I'd shy away from that given Leicester's scoring troubles in the closing stages of last season and the three 0-0 stalemates the Baggies and their fans endured in their final 10 fixtures.
I tipped West Brom to finish bottom of the table in our ante-post relegation preview, based on their long-standing poor form and lack of squad strengthening. Since then, they crucially managed to prize Grady Diangana out of West Ham.
His departure led to public criticism of the club from Hammers captain Mark Noble, which speaks volumes for both what's going on at the London Stadium right now and just how good a player the England Under-21 international is.
Albion's quest for survival will depend largely on how Diangana and another loanee-turned-permanent acquisition, Matheus Pereira, perform this season.
West Brom's drop in form while Diangana was injured last season was stark: two points per game with him, 1.47 without. His 15-game absence very nearly cost them promotion. Both he and Pereira are capable of individual brilliance, and when one is missing it allows the opposition to dedicate further numbers in an effort to restrict the other's impact.
While each has their own strengths, what they have in common is loving to shoot - on average Diangana attempted 2.3 per 90 minutes last season, with Pereira on exactly three.
And being such free-spirited players, they are more likely than most to take a chance from distance - 50% of Pereira's shots on goal came from outside the box, with his team-mate at 39%.
It's the Brazilian who I'm leaning towards for reliability.
Diangana is 3/1 to have 1+ shot on target from outside the area and while those odds are tempting to back with small stakes, Pereira's numbers make 5/4 in the same market a superb price.
He really is someone who has loved a potshot over a consistent period of time.
Across Pereira's whole career - 100 appearances in spells with Nurnberg, Chaves, Sporting and West Brom - his shots per game drops very slightly to 2.7, but the outside the area percentage jumps to 59%.
If only there was a packed Hawthorns screaming "shoooot" to bay him on on our behalf.
Maybe he'll hear us all through the TV.
Score prediction: West Brom 1-1 Leicester (Sky Bet odds: 11/2)
Best bets:
Opta Stats
- West Bromwich Albion have lost their last four Premier League home games against Leicester City – their longest ever losing streak at home to the Foxes.
- Leicester City have never won five consecutive away Premier League games against a single opponent, with their four straight wins versus West Brom their joint-best such streak in the competition (also vs Newcastle in January 2020).
- The home side has never won in eight previous Premier League meetings between West Bromwich Albion and Leicester (D2 L6) – only Bournemouth v Watford (10) has been played more in the competition without the home side ever winning.
- West Brom and Leicester City have both lost six times on the opening weekend of a Premier League season, although the Baggies have won their last two such matches and the Foxes are winless in four (D1 L3).
- West Brom have won their opening league match of the season in three of the last four campaigns (L1), having won just twice in their previous 18 (D6 L10).
- Leicester have won their opening Premier League match of the season in just one of their last 11 attempts (D5 L5), though that win came in their title-winning season in 2015-16, (4-2 against Sunderland).
- After collecting 24 points in an eight-game winning run between October and December 2019, Leicester won the same number of points in their final 22 Premier League matches of the 2019-20 season (W6 D6 L10).
- Leicester have faced newly-promoted sides on the opening day in the top-flight on six previous occasions and won none of those (D3 L3), losing most recently in 2016-17 as reigning champions against Hull City.
- West Brom’s Matheus Pereira assisted 16 league goals in 2019-20, second only to Kevin De Bruyne (20) in England’s top four tiers. The only previous Brazilian to appear for the Baggies in the Premier League was Sandro in 2016 (12 appearances).
- Leicester’s Jamie Vardy has scored in all four of his away Premier League appearances against West Bromwich Albion – the only player in Premier League history to play more away matches against an opponent and score in each match is Ruud van Nistelrooy at Newcastle (scored in all five).
Odds correct as of 1400 BST on 11/09/20
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