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Newcastle conceding 7.27 xG is beyond alarming
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Back Sunderland to get a result in crunch FA Cup clash
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Average Premier League goal average hits 3.13 per game
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Lay woeful Newcastle in FA Cup at Sunderland
There are things in life that are unacceptable. Backing anything shorter than 3/1 each way, daring to get away with putting under 3.5 pigs in blankets on my Christmas dinner plate and any sort of betting after-timing spring to mind.
Newcastle conceding 7.27 worth of expected goals in a Premier League match also falls into that category. It's a phenomenal number to concede. If Liverpool had won 8-0, Eddie Howe could have had no complaints.
Of course, Jurgen Klopp's men deserve credit for recording the highest xG total on record (since 2010-11) in a single Premier League game but seriously - what has happened to Newcastle? They are a shadow of the team that powered their way to a Champions League spot last season.
They have gone from hard to beat to almost a guaranteed three points.
There was an alarming lack of cohesion in their defending in that 4-2 Anfield defeat and not once did they muster the confidence or energy to sustain attacks towards the Liverpool goal. It was soft. It was timid. It was worrying.
The combination of the unprecedented number of injuries they have suffered, the increased schedule with Champions League football, and the ban for Sandro Tonali have made it challenging for Howe but this now runs deeper than just fatigue. Newcastle have now lost nine Premier League games this season. They lost just five games all last season.
It's now seven loses in their last eight games across all competitions and they have picked up just five Premier League away points - only Sheffield Utd (2) have fewer.
The 7.27 worth of expected goals shipped at Anfield now means only Luton have a worse combined expected goals against record away from home this season than Newcastle's (23.52).
There is no respite provided by the fixture list either with Man City and Aston Villa waiting for the Toon in January. And in the middle of that there is Sunderland at the Stadium of Light on Saturday in a FA Cup third-round clash to get the blood pumping. A fixture of such importance, riddled with huge expectation for a Newcastle win, is the last thing Howe needs right now.
I'll be laying them at 1.845/6 on the Betfair Exchange.
Over 2.5 backers in absolute clover
Those that have the stomach and historically proven shrewdness for backing Premier League games to go down a low scoring avenue have been through some intense open wallet surgery this season.
The goals are flowing at an astonishing rate - record levels - and there is no stopping this trend based on the Christmas period.
Since Christmas Day, 16 of the last 19 Premier League games have seen the over 2.5 goal line breached. The total per-game average for the season now stands at a simply monstrous 3.13 over a healthy 197 game sample size. If this ratio remains consistent for the remainder, it's going to soar past the previous Premier League record of goals-per-game average, which was recorded last season at 2.85.
There are no signs of that rate slowing either. The overall strike rate for over 2.5 goals in Premier League matches this season currently stands at 63% - again, that is way up on the usual Premier League average, which traditionally sits somewhere between 51-54%.
Are we at a point now with Premier League matches where, if over 2.5 goals is trading anywhere near Evens in a two-horse race, it must be considered as a bet? That is certainly the case with Burnley v Luton on Monday 15 January where there's bound to be Exchange movement on the 1.981/1 for over 2.5 goals.