The derby, the big title deciding............oh hold on a minute, its not quite the huge season defining moment Sky Sports were hoping for, is it.
Utd have the chance to extend their lead to 18pts by beating their local rivals tonight and with only 7 games remaining after the derby, a win all but seals a 20th league title for Sir Alex Ferguson's team. To be honest, even if City were to win the match the title is still heading to Old Trafford barring a collapse of titanic proportions.
Being a lifelong Utd fan, it can be very difficult to stop my emotions coming into play while trading any Utd match and even more so in big games like the derby. Letting your emotions impact your trading decisions is just about the worst thing you can possibly do and on occasion I've decided not to trade Utd games for that reason. However, with Utd on TV almost every week and with the team often involved in high scoring matches they simply offer too many trading opportunities to miss.
Trading Opportunities
Match Odds -
Utd at 2.38
Draw at 3.55
City at 3.30
I have Utd priced up at about 2.16 for this match so the 2.38 currently available looks great value to me and should offer a good PMT opportunity, especially if both Vida and Rooney start in a full strength team. City have been poor away from home again this season and with recent defeats at both Everton and Southampton, it's hard to see how Utd's price is so big.
Utd won 3-2 at the Etihad earlier in the season while at home against similar level opposition, their record reads P11 W9 D0 L2 over the past 4 years. City meanwhile have managed just 3 wins from 12 away matches against similar opposition over the same period.
City are obviously more than capable of winning this game on their day but momentum is firmly with Utd at the moment and they're sure to be going flat out to win the match and effectively the title tonight. I'll be monitoring the Utd price during the day with a view to backing them with 50% stake on official team news, if the team is strong and the price looks likely to shorten. I'll close just before KO and might well weight the profit towards Utd but I'll update on Twitter as KO approaches.
Goal Market Odds -
Under 2.5 at 2.18
Over 2.5 at 1.83
Though the Manchester derby has seen some high scoring matches in the past, only 5 of the last 11 have had Over 2.5 goals but, 3 of those have come in the last 4 meetings between the two. Also, of the 11 matches at home Utd played against similar opposition mentioned above, 10 of them had Over 2.5 goals. Although, only 6 of City's 12 matches away against similar opposition had Over 2.5 goals, most of them came at a time when they were defending better and were set up much more defensively.
Utd are currently on a run of 6 consecutive clean sheets and although City are a shadow of the team which won the title last season they still have match winners all over the pitch. The derby gives them the opportunity to remind everyone why they won the title last season and I expect them to put up a real fight. With this in mind, I think the game will see a few goals and the Over 2.5 price looks good at 1.83, I'll be looking to open TOOT around the 10min mark as usual and managing the trade through the 90mins.
Summary -
I honestly can't see Utd losing this match and as much as I want to see a big Utd win, a score draw wouldn't be a surprise at all (dutching 1-1 & 2-2 might pay off nicely) and obviously BTTS is an option. City have nothing left to play for this season other than this match and if they can't raise their performance levels tonight, they might as well give up. Hopefully, I'll get good opportunities with PMT and TOOT and will update how things are going via Twitter.
I'll also post up a live trading review after the match, as always feel free to ask any questions and follow live ramblings on Twitter.
@DarkDyson
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