Football tips: 7/1 Salah central to our Sunday selections for Liverpool v Crystal Palace

Our stats guru Andrew Beasley has your bets tackled as The Reds look to lock down a top four finish at Anfield.

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By / Football Tips / 3 years ago

* All prices are bang up to date with our snazzy widgets, while odds in copy are accurate at time of publishing but subject to change.

The 2020/21 season will not be remembered fondly at Liverpool, but after a rollercoaster journey which saw them top of the table at Christmas and seventh in March, the Reds are on the brink of securing a top four finish in May.

The only man standing in their way is a former Liverpool boss who bows out from the professional game this weekend.  After a managerial journey which has lasted over 45 years and taken in over 1,200 matches for 20 different club and national sides, Roy Hodgson has decided to call time on it all at the age of 73.

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And his career will draw to a close at one of his former teams who don’t hold him in high esteem. Hodgson’s Liverpool tenure was as brief as it was disastrous, with his side only accumulating 25 points from his 20 games at the helm. But, the Anfield hierarchy of the time should’ve known what to expect, as his average across his time in six national leagues has been 1.35 points-per-game, it has been 1.26 in the Premier League, and Liverpool got 1.25 out of him.

The Hodgson Consistency sounds like a straight-to-DVD knock off Jason Bourne film, but it certainly sums up his career well. There’s no club too big or small for Roy, he can steer them towards a point total in the mid-40 regardless.

Sunday 15:00 – Liverpool v Crystal Palace
Sky Sports Main Event

Short-price punt: Liverpool To Win

While Liverpool have veered from the sublime to the ridiculous over both the Premier League years as a whole, and this season specifically, you can rely on them to sign off a season in style if they are on their own patch. The Reds have played their final league match of a campaign at home 13 times in the modern era of English football, winning 11 of them with two draws.

Palace haven’t finished their league commitments away from home since 2017, when they lost 2-0 at Old Trafford. Their previous final day win on the road came at Colchester in the Championship 14 years ago.

And while Liverpool can secure Champions League football with a win, the most exciting thing on the Eagles’ radar is potentially moving up to 12th. Their average finish in the past three seasons under Hodgson? You can guess, can’t you?

The much better team have a much greater need for the points, and while strange things can happen on the final day, they shouldn’t occur at Anfield where Liverpool will get a routine win.

Jurgen Klopp

The Value bet: Match Shots – Over 35 Shots

Matches like this can be difficult to predict thanks to the wildly differing aims and priorities of the two teams involved. Jurgen Klopp has been talking this up as a cup final for a couple of weeks, but is it really a cup final when only one team has anything to play for?

That’s not strictly true. Palace have 16 players who are out of contract this summer, so there’s plenty of men on the away team playing for their Premier League futures on a personal level. And they should get chances in this match. The Reds have done incredibly well to get this far with their patched-up defence, but they do give up a lot of shots. That said, despite their own troubles at Anfield this season, Liverpool have had the second-most home shots in the division. The longer this match stays 0-0 the more desperate they’ll get too.

So, unless they go two or three goals up really early, Klopp’s boys will be launching wave after wave of attack, in case Leicester beat Tottenham 9-0 (and we can’t rule that out the way Spurs are playing).

There have been an average of 28 shots in Liverpool’s last four matches at Anfield, and Palace recently had a dead rubber with Aston Villa which featured 42. Over 35 shots is the outside bet in this market and yet, it feels very possible.

The long-shot: #WhatOddsPaddy – Mohamed Salah – Salah To Score 2 Or More Goals & Assist 1 Or More Goals

The initial thought for this bet was to back Mohamed Salah to score a hat-trick, as Liverpool’s number 11 has the Golden Boot in his sights and only the team with the third-worst defensive record in the Premier League standing in his way.

But, Paddy obviously knows that, and so the odds for that outcome are not actually that long. We’ll spice it up a bit by throwing in an assist on top of two goals for the Egyptian instead. Salah was only on the pitch for 33 minutes when these sides last met, and sure enough he bagged a brace and teed up a goal for Roberto Firmino.

In his 23 league appearances for the Reds since that match, he has laid on chances worth 3.4 expected assists and only has one actual assist to show for it.

He will be desperate for goals and is due an assist, so this bet looks to be a good punt.

Liverpool v Crystal Palace tips

Liverpool To Win
Match Shots – Over 35 Shots
#WhatOddsPaddy – Mohamed Salah – Salah To Score 2 Or More Goals & Assist 1 Or More Goals

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