Newcastle corner count may exceed layers' expectations

Premier League
3pm Saturday

Back Newcastle to take more corners than Brighton in the Premier League game at St James’ Park. You can get 10-11 with Sky Bet, who may have underestimated how much possession Newcastle will have and how much attacking they will do.

Newcastle are second from bottom with two points from eight games. But five of those were against the big six. Newcastle lost all five but generally played well. In other games they drew at Crystal Palace and Cardiff – acceptable results.

You could argue that Newcastle’s only truly disappointing outcome was a 2-0 defeat at home to Leicester. If they win on Saturday they could climb out of the relegation zone. Winning will be far from easy, though. Brighton are 13th with a commendable eight points from eight games.

Brighton were promoted from the Sky Bet Championship with Newcastle in season 2016-17. For the last two and a bit seasons they have played in the same division, and during that time Brighton have won one point more than Newcastle.

There is no obvious reason to think there will be much separating the teams other than the ground advantage Newcastle will enjoy. And that is what the result-related markets seem to be saying.

They imply a 57 per cent chance of Newcastle scoring each goal that is scored, which is roughly what we should anticipate in any Premier League match between two teams who at a neutral venue would probably be evenly balanced.

Over the last 20 Premier League seasons in games with similar goals expectations fair odds about the hosts taking most corners would usually have been about 10-13.

Since Newcastle returned to the Premier League they have recorded an uncommonly small share of possession and corners. But so have Brighton. Arguably those considerations cancel each other out, meaning fair odds about Newcastle taking most corners at St James’ Park should still be in the region of 10-13.

In their Premier League games since the start of last season Newcastle have had 40 per cent possession and taken 43 per cent of the corners. Brighton have had 42 per cent possession and taken 41 per cent of the corners. So Brighton had a slightly higher share of the ball but a slightly lower share of flag-kicks.

From now on it is likely that both teams will have more possession and take a larger share of corners. It is even possible that both could start this week. Hopefully, though, one team will take more corners than the other and that team will be Newcastle.

Recommendation
Newcastle to take more corners than Brighton
1pt 10-11 Sky Bet

Bet on this game at Soccerbase.com

Thought for the day

A lot has been made of the fact that on Monday England won in Spain for the first time in 31 years. Where did the last win lead?

In February 1987 England beat Spain 4-2 with four goals from Gary Lineker, who played his club football for Barcelona at the time. The following year at Euro 88 England lost all three of their games and finished bottom of their group.

England’s previous win in Spain had been 2-0 in March 1980. Later that year in Italy in their final group game at Euro 80 England played Spain again and won 2-1, but that was enough only for them to finish second from bottom, albeit above Spain.

In May 1968 England won 2-1 in Spain in a Euro 68 quarter-final second leg. They went through 3-1 on aggregate. Back then the European Championship was a home-and-away competition until the semi-finals. England lost in the semi-finals but won the third place playoff.

England’s only other win in Spain was 2-0 in December 1965. Seven months later they lifted the World Cup.

So while the victory by Gareth Southgate's side was seen as a major breakthrough by some, history suggests we shouldn't read too much into it.

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