Mark Langdon's weekend tips & football accas | EFL & Serie A

Free football tips, bets and analysis.

Best bets

Coventry
1pt 4-5 Coral, Ladbrokes
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Salford
1pt 5-4 general
Click here to back this tip with Hills

Sassuolo
1pt Evs general
Click to back this tip with bet365

Southend v Coventry

3pm Saturday

Sol Campbell seems to have a sense for difficult managerial jobs but the Southend role is probably harder than he could have envisaged and Coventry's trip to the seaside should return them maximum points.

Southend have accumulated just 16 points from 30 Sky Bet League One matches this season and their goal difference - a miserable minus 43 - took another battering on Tuesday in a 4-0 defeat at Peterborough.

The Essex side had looked to have slightly turned the corner with home draws against Rotherham, MK Dons, Tranmere and a win (their first since September 21) against Lincoln.

However, Campbell, who was fighting a financial crisis at Macclesfield last season, has walked into another job where money is tight as Southend appear to have long accepted their relegation fate.

There may be some sense in holding back money for next season but it does not help now.

Miles Mitchell-Belson, Terrell Egbri and Matt Rush were handed their full debuts at Peterborough and Campbell said afterwards: "We have half the Under-23 squad out there playing a top League One side. We shouldn't really have so many in the same side."

Coventry have got the sniff of promotion in their nostrils following Tuesday's huge 1-0 success over in-form Portsmouth, taking the Sky Blues to within two points of leaders Rotherham with a game in hand.

Substitute Matt Godden's goal separated the sides and Cov are clearly a class act this term, losing just three league matches and doing so in an attractive manner under Mark Robins.

Left-back or wing-back Sam McCallum has already signed for Norwich next season and they look particularly strong in central midfield with Liam Walsh alongside Liam Kelly.

Given the compact nature of League One the teams at the top are going to need to play on the front foot home or away and Cov look well suited to that judging by recent road triumphs at Bristol Rovers, Doncaster, Tranmere and Wycombe.

Stevenage v Salford

3pm Saturday

Bookmakers were wary of a summer spending spree from Salford, who had the potential to go big given they are bankrolled by billionaire Peter Lim and Manchester United's Class of '92.

Maybe the club wanted to stand by those who got them up via the National League playoffs or maybe they genuinely believed the squad was good enough to compete at the top end of League Two.

Either way City rarely threatened in the first half of the season and their place among the promotion favourites quickly disappeared as layers realised Graham Alexander's side were a long way short.

That's no longer the case as Salford are putting down a significant marker to be taken seriously next season and have a small chance of gatecrashing the playoff spots this term following an impressive January overhaul of the squad.

Tom Elliott (Millwall), Ashley Hunter (Fleetwood), Ashley Eastham (Fleetwood), Michael O'Connor (Lincoln), Bruno Adrande (Lincoln) and James Wilson (Aberdeen) are among those to have arrived from higher-ranked clubs.

Salford are proving popular in the betting markets every week and are playing much better than a run of two wins in nine league matches in 2020 would suggest.

They had 16 shots inside the box against Plymouth on Tuesday but lost 3-2 despite Argyle managing just six in the 18-yard area, and then smashed in 20 shots to Crawley's three in a 0-0 draw last Saturday.

Wilson scored twice in a 30-minute debut appearance against Plymouth and can help Salford to beat rock-bottom Stevenage. Boro have lost five on the spin and are seven points from safety.

Sassuolo v Parma

2pm Sunday

There's not much between Sassuolo and Parma but they appear to be heading in different directions and the hosts can draw level on points with the visitors in Serie A.

Parma have had to deal with injury problems, although that can only partly excuse a serious dip in performance, albeit from a tricky run of fixtures.

Four wins in nine reads quite nicely but Parma have lost the expected goal count in each of their last ten matches.

Slick Sassuolo have beaten Torino, Roma and Spal in their last four matches and the draw against Sampdoria to complete the set was an impressive 0-0 stalemate given defender Federico Peluso was red carded on 25 minutes.

Jeremie Boga, Domenico Berardi and Francesco Caputo give Sassuolo a fairly strong attacking dimension by mid-table Serie A standards.

Weekend accumulators

Banker
Coventry 4-5
There is the very real possibility of Coventry being in the Championship next season and Southend are virtually certain to be in League Two. Expect that gulf to show at Roots Hall.

Blowout
Ipswich Evs
The Suffolk natives are restless and right on boss Paul Lambert's back after a return of one point from the last 12 available. Home advantage may not be worth much against Burton.

Accumulator
Portsmouth 6-10, Rotherham 2-5, Coventry 4-5, Swindon
3-4. £1 accumulator returns £7.06 with Coral.

Both teams to score
Games at Birmingham 4-5, Oldham 5-6, Atalanta 4-9. £1 treble returns £4.77 with bet365.

Thought for the week

If Pep Guardiola does not win the Champions League as Manchester City manager he will leave England as a failure. Discuss.

There will be those who believe that to be true and many say it about his time at Bayern Munich, although it is never heard from those at the club.

They loved what he did at Bayern and were far more understanding of the weird dynamics which often decide tight knockout competitions than the detractors who are usually wound up by the gushing praise Guardiola's attractive teams receive.

Just look at Chelsea. They have had so many great managers in the Roman Abramovich era yet the two who took them to Champions League finals were Avram Grant and Roberto Di Matteo.

Guardiola has already won the Champions League as a manager twice - the same as Sir Alex Ferguson - but some say it's only because he had Lionel Messi.

In the seven years since Guardiola left Camp Nou Barca have had Messi every time and won it just once more. Of course Messi helps but if it were that easy then everyone would be able to do it.

City may win the Champions League. They may go out to Real Madrid in the last 16 but it's a nonsense to judge a relatively short tenure on what is a competition where luck last season plays a part.