Southampton vs Middlesbrough: Betting Odds & Prediction
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Southampton entertain Middlesbrough at St Mary’s in a vital Championship clash on Friday afternoon.
Both sides are still dreaming of playing Premier League football next season. Kick-off is set for 3pm UK time.
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Southampton
Southampton currently sit fourth in the table, nine points off the automatic promotion spots and with two games in hand on third-placed Ipswich Town and league leaders Leeds United.
Saints’ fans will be breathing a little easier after their side rediscovered their winning touch with recent victories against Sunderland and Birmingham. The nerves were starting to jangle following four losses in the space of five games last month. The rot began with a 3-1 away defeat at Bristol City on February 13th. Southampton had been 25-games unbeaten prior to the game at Ashton Gate.
There may have been some frayed nerves at St Mary’s of late, but at least the games were never dull. In the previous ten matches there, 43 goals have been scored, an average of 4.3 goals a game.
Southampton have the highest expected goals (xG) figure (1.89) in the Championship and that increases to exactly two when they play at home. League matches involving Saints this season have averaged 3.33 goals per game, and again that increases to 3.83 at St Mary’s.
Middlesbrough
Middlesbrough lie tenth in the table, seven points adrift of the play-off zone with only eight games left to play. A 0-0 home draw against struggling Blackburn last time was frustrating, especially given Boro had won their previous three matches prior to the clash.
Nevertheless, they are now four games unbeaten which is their best sequence of results since a seven game winning streak at the end of September. That particular run started with a 2-1 home win against Southampton.
Middlesbrough’s recent away form has been decent. They’ve won five of their last seven league matches, including their last two. They’ve also netted in seven of their previous eight away games, scoring 12 goals in those encounters (an average of 1.5 goals per game). An average of 3.37 goals have been scored during their away league matches this season, which is the third highest in the Championship.
Prediction
Despite back-to-back victories against Sunderland and Birmingham, Southampton still shipped multiple goals against those out-of-sorts sides and have conceded in five games straight. We can’t see them keeping a spurred-on Boro side at bay either. The locals have grown accustomed to goalfests at St Mary’s and we don’t expect this to be any different.