Manchester United is back as a winning team.
Marcus Rashford, Jadon Sancho and Bruno Fernandes have been able to taste victories for a change. AOP/EPA
The most interesting game of the day
The highly anticipated arrival as Manchester United’s manager for this season Erik ten Hag seems to have managed to turn his team into a winner after the miserable opening games of the season. At the moment, United, who lost their first two matches of the season to Brighton and Brentford by a total of 1-6, are already on a three-match winning streak. In terms of play, the Manchester team have not performed any real circus tricks in the last matches either, but the victories have come with a rough basic game. Measured by expected goals, United has not been quite worthy of their victories in their matches against Liverpool, Southampton or Leicester, but effective teams quite often win their games by just doing what is necessary properly. In addition, turning the direction or the spiritual significance of victories should never be underestimated in team sports. Right now United are on a good track – winning breeds winning.
Arsenal’s season has been close to perfection so far. The team is somewhat deservedly at the top of the Premier League with a clean record of 5-0-0 goals with a 13-4 record. It’s hard to find weaknesses in Arsenal at the moment. For example, the team’s strong mental edge is indicated by the fact that in their last matches against Fulham and Aston Villa, Arsenal was practically able to immediately offset the goals scored by the opponent with their own goal. However, the fact that all of the team’s opponents so far have belonged to the weaker half of the series deserves a little attention in Arsenal’s flight. Manchester United is indeed the first real measure for the Gunners, if, for example, we weigh the team’s championship chances this season.
United’s most recent giant acquisitions Casemiro or Antony’s not yet expected to be in the opener against Arsenal – possibly and probably on the bench though. Anthony Martial and Facundo Pellistri missing with certainty and Luke Shaw mixed Aaron Wan-Bissaka are 50/50 cases. Ten Hag is expected to play its team in a very similar composition as it has now played in its winning games. Arsenal may have an even bigger gap in their midfield in this match, as they have already been missing before
of Thomas Partey and Mohamed Elneny besides also excelling in the early season Martin Ødegaard got a knock last time and the Norwegian’s playing style is an enigma. The defense is lacking Oleksandr Zinchenko and also the number one goalkeeper Aaron Ramsdale playing is 50/50. From all of this, Arsenal’s playing power can very well be reduced.
As for the balance of power in the match, I’m pretty strongly in favor of United because of the home advantage and Arsenal’s probable absences. Veikkaus offers United market-leading odds in almost all handicapping categories. I like Asian handicaps +0.25 with odds of 1.72 so well that Manchester United gets to the coupon.
The match starts at 18:30.
The best betting tip of the day
In terms of betting, Sunday’s other interesting match can be found in La Liga (Athletic Bilbao–Espanyol). Athletic Bilbao has started their season with a very close game and won their first three matches without conceding a goal. Apart from Valencia, the opponents have not been particularly high-quality (the other two are Cadiz and Mallorca), but in addition to conceding zero goals, despite not expecting a goal, Athletic has only conceded 1.4 goals to their opponents. In principle, there is nothing to be surprised about, because the team’s coach Ernesto Valverde is an advocate of controlled and ball-based defense. The balances primarily tell that Athletic’s game is working at the moment. Even at home, Athletic hardly ever breaks the balance of their game by over-attacking.
Espanyol’s season has gotten off to a weak start in light of the results, but the statistics reveal that the team was the unluckiest team in La Liga in the opening rounds, along with Sevilla. In the opening match against Celta, Espanyol would have deserved a victory, and the last time Real Madrid scored goals at the very end of the match did not do justice to Espanyol’s good play. Thinking about this match, the most significant thing about Espanyol’s early season balances is that the team has conceded three more goals than it should have conceded in terms of expected goals. Espanyol is not quite as generous as it might seem at first glance. Against Athletic, Espanyol have a few notable absences. The team’s top scorer in the previous couple of seasons Raul de Tomas missing from the lineup due to injury. With this, I see a big impact directly on both the goal threat created by the team and the coach by Diego Martinez to tactical choices. I believe that Espanyol will now play in Bilbao quite defensively. Also the goalkeeper who played all of Espanyol’s league games this season Benjamin Lecomte missing now due to suspension. Here, however, I see the effect on goal number coefficients greater than the change of Lecomte to Joan García in terms of the game itself. Veikkaus may have slightly overreacted to the lack of the first goalkeeper from Espanyol by offering the market’s highest odds of 1.83 for the match under 2.5 goals. My own odds limit for under is 1.80, so it’s a marginal over-odds.
Athletic Bilbao–Espanyol starts at 17:15.
Today’s games: Manchester United+0.25 – Arsenal 1 (odds 1.72).
Total balance of the day’s games for the year: 38/63/112%
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