Thursday Football Tips: 15/2 shot for bet £5, get £5 offer

• Lenient ref has hit under 3.5 cards in 10 of 13

• Doherty fouls & BTTS completes 15/2 shot

• Back it with our 'bet £5, get £5' big-match offer

With a limited Thursday's fixture list for props punters, it makes sense to focus on the night's Premier League match - especially given Betfair's 'bet £5, get £5' offer on for the game.

Let's start our Bet Builder by backing under 3.5 cards.

City are top of the fair-play table having averaged exactly one card per game across their matches so far.

Spurs are at double that level but the combined average is still below the required mark - and there's another good reason that this should be backed.

Referee Simon Hooper is one of the most lenient in the top flight - in terms of cards shown, he sits 20th out of the 21 officials to have taken charge of a Premier League game this season.

His average is 2.92 per game but in terms of under 3.5 cards, this bet would have landed in 10 of his 13 matches to date.

In addition, Hooper has taken charge of Spurs three times this season and shown them only three cards, while in his one City game, Pep Guardiola's side didn't receive a yellow or red.

While Hooper is, unsurprisingly, also lenient when it comes to fouls numbers, I also like Matt Doherty 2+ fouls which is a 6/4 chance as a single.

He could well be going up against Jack Grealish, who is the fourth most fouled player (on the fouls per game metric) this season. The England international would certainly give the right wing-back problems if he starts, while even if he doesn't a second-half introduction could well get this bet over the line.

Doherty has committed 2+ fouls in four of his seven Premier League starts this season, including both away games since the World Cup - at Palace (when up against another top dribbler in Wilfried Zaha) and Brentford.

For those worried by the fairly low data sample, it's worth noting that Doherty has also landed this bet in all four internationals for Ireland this season.

Finally, to what is probably the riskiest part of the treble - both teams to score.

I'm sure every reader is aware that if City turn it back on, they are capable of winning this by multiple goals without conceding.

But the reason I'm happy to side with this element is shown in that sentence in the words 'back on'.

City have certainly been off it in terms of their own standards of late, winning only two of their last five. Go back a bit further and you see that Guardiola's men have conceded in eight of their last 11.

With Harry Kane and Dejan Kulusevski both on song, and Richarlison ready to contribute again, Spurs offer the threat to breach them here too.

They scored three times in this fixture last season and can be deadly on the break.

However, things are not so good at the other end and I find it hard to see them keeping City out - they have just one clean sheet in their last nine in this competition.

Put it all together and you get a price around 15/2.

Read Paul Higham's in-depth preview of Man City v Spurs!