Stats / Bettorlogic / 01 November 2008 / Leave a comment

Manchester City's swashbuckling playing style featuring the likes of Robinho and Elano has brought plenty of goals but not that many wins and is in stark contrast to Bolton's more direct style. Let's see what number-crunchers supreme Bettorlogic make of it all.

Match Odds

Marouane Fellaini's late goal in midweek condemned Bolton to their second consecutive defeat and dropped them into the bottom three for the first time this season. City also lost on Wednesday night and Mark Hughes' side have been struggling for consistency - scoring the most goals in the league this season but still losing half of their matches.

City's loss at the Riverside gives them 12 defeats in their 24 away games dating back to last season, while they have won only five away games in that time. Four of those victories came against bottom-half sides, part of a W4-D5-L7 record in that time, although oddly they are winless in nine (W0-D5-L4) at bottom-six teams.

Bolton's loss to Everton was only their ninth in 56 at home to non-Big Four sides since 2005, admittedly a lot of which was achieved during Sam Allardyce's reign. However, it is not significantly inferior under Megson (W6-D6-L3) which, along with City's sub-par away record, suggests the City win is far too short ([2.44]) and should be laid.

Correct score

Excluding games against the Big Four, 0-0 has been by far (5/15, nothing else more than 2/15) the most common score at the Reebok since Gary Megson's arrival. City have no such clear-cut pattern to their recent away games, with 1-1 (3/18) the most frequent against non-Big Four clubs since the start of last season. They have also had two goalless draws in that sample, lending some support to the [12.5] price. But their games under Hughes have been much higher scoring (9/10 +2.5) than in Sven's time (16/38 +2.5) which puts us off the call.

HT/FT

Since the start of 2005/06, Bolton have lost only two first halves at home to non-Big Four teams (HT W16-D31-L2) and both came in the ill-fated Sammy Lee era. Gary Megson's half-time record is W5-D10-L0. Thanks to the goalless draws, the D/D (5/15) has occurred most often, followed by the W/W and D/W (both 3/15).

The D/D (7/20) is also the most common HT/FT outcome in City's away matches since the start of last season (excluding at the Big Four), with that and the L/L (6/20) accounting for a good majority of their away games (both 5/16 at bottom-half sides).
Given those numbers, the D/D looks value at [5.6].

Bolton clean sheet

Blackburn are the only non-Big Four team to score more than once at the Reebok in Megson's tenure, with Bolton keeping nine clean sheets in 15 games in that period - second only to Man Utd (10/16). City's failure to score at 'Boro was their first zero since a trip to Anfield in the penultimate match of last season, and the sixth instance in 20 games at non-Big Four sides since the start of last season.

It is hard to call a clean sheet against the league's top scorers, but Bolton's impressive defensive record under Megson suggests that the value here lies in backing the home clean sheet ([4.0]).

Man City clean sheet

City have kept clean sheets in four of their eight games against non-Big Four sides this term, but they have managed only six on the road since the start of last season (4/16 at bottom-half teams). Bolton have found the net in all four of Megson's games at home to the Big Four but have done so in only just over half (8/15) against the rest of the league. Again, the value here is probably 'Yes' ([3.3]).