Premier League Betting: Wigan Athletic v Chelsea

Premier League / Dan Fitch / 20 August 2010 / Leave a Comment

Didier Drogba has started the season in typical deadly form.

What sort of team loses 9-1 to Spurs and 8-0 to Chelsea, yet manages to beat Chelsea at home and also record wins over Arsenal, Aston Villa and Liverpool?

The league table already has a familiar look to it as high-flying Chelsea travel to struggling Wigan. Dan 'The Betting Man' Fitch eyes a Chelsea win and plenty of goals. Best Bet: Back both teams to score @ [2.38].

Venue: DW Stadium
Kick-Off/TV: Saturday 17:15, Sky Sports 2

Second from bottom plays top of the league. Generally at this stage of the season it's not worth paying too much attention to the league table, but in the case of Wigan and Chelsea, no one would be surprised if they were to finish the campaign in these spots.

Wigan really couldn't have had a worse start than to lose 4-0 at home to newly promoted Blackpool and it reinforced the widely held belief that they have a very difficult season ahead. The last team they would have wanted to face now is Chelsea, who kicked off their attempt to retain their league title with a 6-0 victory in which they didn't even play that well.

Both teams will be able to pretty much name full strength sides. Wigan are missing the banned Gary Caldwell, whilst Chelsea will be without their right back Jose Boswinga.

The one position where Chelsea are lacking in cover is at right full back, with Paolo Ferreira well past his best. Unfortunately for Wigan, their tricky left-winger Charles N'Zogbia is currently on strike in an attempt to engineer a transfer, though their young starlet Victor Moses will be eager to cause Chelsea problems.

Match Odds: Wigan [16.5], Chelsea [1.27], the draw [6.4].

Although I'm pretty sure that Chelsea will win, there's absolutely no point in risking any money at these odds. A price of [1.27] for a team playing away from home is never much of a bet, even if they're league champions.

This is especially true when the opposition is Wigan, who specialised in being unpredictable last season. What sort of team loses 9-1 to Spurs and 8-0 to Chelsea, yet manages to beat Chelsea at home and also record wins over Arsenal, Aston Villa and Liverpool?

Unlike many struggling teams, Wigan play very open, attacking football. Often that results in them being punished, but on their day, they can cause any team problems.

Over/Under 2.5 Goals

Over 2.5 goals is the clear favourite at [1.67], with unders at [2.42]. This isn't surprising considering that Chelsea knocked eight past Wigan when they last played.

Taking into account last season and their game last weekend, Wigan's games have produced over 2.5 goals on seven of their last eight matches. Chelsea scored seven goals on three occasions last season and eight against Wigan. That [1.67] is looking generous in my view, as is the [2.62] for over 3.5 goals.

Both Teams To Score

There were only 13 league games last season in which Wigan didn't score a goal and they kept eight clean sheets. So on average they scored in 66% of their matches, whilst keeping a clean sheet in just 21%.

Chelsea scored over 100 league goals last season and have hit the ground running this term. They only kept seven clean sheets away from home and given these statistics, I think that the [2.38] for both teams to score is somewhat overpriced, with odds of [1.68] available for both teams not to score.

Correct Score

With very little value available on the match odds, the correct score market is the place to go if you have strong feelings about a certain result.

As I fancy both over 2.5 goals and both teams to score, you might want to look at the 1-0 Chelsea win at [8.0] to cover yourself. The 2-1 to Chelsea at [10.0] is decent value, but my main recommendation in this market would be 3-1 to Chelsea at [15.0].

Best Bet: Back both teams to score @ [2.38]
Recommended Bets: Back over 2.5 goals @ 1.67 and back 3-1 to Chelsea @ [15.0].