LIGUE 1 comes to a close on Saturday night. Mark O’Haire (@MarkOHaire) highlights the best bets from the final matchday.
Toulouse v Nice | Saturday 20.00
Ligue 1 comes to a close on Saturday night and what promised to be a thrilling finale has ended up being a bit of anti-climax. Bar the battle for the third and final Champions League qualifying position, all the major talking points have already been decided.
Toulouse looked to be in danger of the drop before Dominique Arribage arrived after seven years of Alain Casanova’s management. His return of W4-D1-L3 was enough to keep Les Pitchouns’ heads above water with 10 of those 13 points picked up at their Stadium Municipal home.
TFC started to showcase a much more attack-minded side with Arribage encouraging his side to get forward and express themselves. Unsurprisingly, Toulouse have now scored in all eight of the Ligue 1 games under the new boss with six delivering in the Both Teams To Score column.
The BTTS bet has been a common winner at the Stadium Municipal this season too. Les Pitchouns have only failed to net in two of their 18 outings on home soil with Both Teams To Score proving profitable in 12/18 (67%) outings.
On Saturday Nice make the trip from east to mid-west enjoying their own impressive run in front of goal. Claude Puel’s charges have netted in 10 of their last 11 with nine of those matches seeing both sides get on the scoresheet.
And it’s a similar story when taking a look at Les Aiglons’ road record with BTTS banking in five of their most recent six and Nice scoring on 10 of their last 16 away days.
With that in mind, plus the fact Puel could be without up to four potential starting defenders, I’m keen to get involved on Both Teams To Score paying out once more with Betway a best price of 3/4 on a repeat for Saturday night’s showdown.
Lens v Nantes | Saturday 20.00
Relegated Lens complete their campaign at home to Nantes. It’s been a miserable season for Lens, on and off the pitch. Since winning promotion back to France’s top tier, the club have been embroiled with financial problems and have struggled to adapt to the higher standards of Ligue 1.
Antoine Kombouaré’s troops have been playing at a temporary home at the Stade de la Licorne all season but have failed to mark their territory sufficiently. Just four wins from 18 in front of their home supporters is a poor return but Les Sang et Or have also been hampered by their terrible record in front of goal.
Lens have failed to even score in seven of their last nine at the Stade de la Licorne and in 10 of their 18 ‘home’ Ligue 1 games since promotion. The Both Teams To Score Bet has banked in only 5/18 (28%) of those fixtures and so BetVictor’s generous offering of 39/40 on ‘No’ in the Both Teams To Score market holds plenty of appeal this weekend.
Nantes are far from prolific when playing away, failing to notch at all in exactly half of their 18 away outings with our proposed bet proving a successful option in 11/18 (61%) of road games. A repeat looks more than likely as both teams bring the curtain down on contrasting seasons.
Putting the two sides’ respective home/away BTTS records together, we should be expecting around a 67% chance of the Both Teams To Score bet failing. Putting that percentage chance into odds format would make this selection around a 1/2 shot, so the 39/40 offers us punters a big dollop of final day value in Ligue 1.
TOPICS European FootballBest Bets
Toulouse v Nice – Both Teams To Score (3/4 Betway)
Lens v Nantes – Both Teams To Score ‘No’ (39/40 BetVictor)
