With the FA Cup taking centre stage this weekend for the fifth round of this season's competition, the Premier League is having a week off, both in reality and also in our spread betting tips.
The focus is all on the cup this week and there are plenty of eye-catching spread markets that we believe have been priced inaccurately and if we are right, then big profits are there for taking.
While all eight cup matches are important for obvious reasons, there are a few ties that will take centre stage. Perhaps most anticipated is Plymouth's trip to the Etihad Stadium on Saturday where they will look to pull off another giant killing.
With a stacked weekend of action looming large, check out our FA Cup spread betting tips below.
Football spread betting tips this weekend: Our picks
| Crystal Palace vs Millwall |
Winning margin |
✅ 1.4 |
1.6 |
| Preston vs Burnley |
Total goals |
✅ 1.95 |
2.15 |
| Newcastle vs Brighton |
Shirt numbers |
59 |
✅ 63 |
| Man Utd vs Fulham |
Scrabbled shirts |
67 |
✅ 72 |
| Man City vs Plymouth |
Bookings |
23 |
✅ 26 |
Winning margin: Millwall to make life difficult for Palace
It's always tasty when a London Derby is pulled out of the hat in the FA Cup and we have exactly that on Saturday with Crystal Palace vs Millwall. While on paper, Crystal Palace will fancy the job, things could quite easily go the other way for a couple of reasons.
Firstly, Crystal Palace's recent upturn in form is a little deceiving. While they have undoubtedly improved, their best stuff has come away from Selhurst Park. In fact, they have only won by two goals in one of their last 14 home matches at home in all competitions.
Millwall are a dogged team, too, and very rarely take a hammering. In fact, they've lost just one of their last nine matches in all competitions and have only by more than one goal once all season.
Total goals: Boring, boring Burnley
On Saturday afternoon, it's Preston vs Burnley in another derby on FA Cup fifth round weekend. The two teams only met in the Championship a couple of weeks ago and although it was a heated affair with plenty of incidents, the match finished 0-0.
A repeat result here would come as a shock to absolutely nobody so the sell price of 1.9 on total goals was certainly a shock to discover. After all, Burnley are the kings of the 0-0 draw with four of their last nine matches finishing by this scoreline.
Preston are hardly rampant goalscorers, either, and they have failed to score more than one goal in any of their last six matches in all competitions.
Shirt numbers: Brighton's high numbers to come up trumps
One of the all-Premier League clashes this weekend is Newcastle vs Brighton in a match that could quite easily turn into a classic end-to-end cup tie. Both teams are blessed with attacking talent and goals are certainly expected.
In terms of covering the buy price of 63 on shirt numbers, though, we need players with high shirt numbers to find the back. Luckily, all of Brighton's most likely goalscorers on the day all have relatively high shirt numbers, including Danny Welbeck (#18) and Kaoru Mitoma (#22).
Newcastle's shirt numbers aren't overly high but they do have the Premier League's third-highest scorer, Alexander Isak, who wears the number 14. Other notable names and numbers include Jacob Murphy (#23) and Bruno Guimaraes (#39).
Scabbled shirts: Still banking on the potential of Zirkzee
A few times now we have backed the buy price on scrabbled shirts with Man Utd because the potential for a huge win is undoubtedly there. On Sunday, they are likely to start several players in attacking positions whose names are worth significant points via the Scrabble points system.
A Joshua Zirkzee goal alone would be worth 45 points while a goal for fellow striker, Rasmus Hojlund, would be worth 26 points. Meanwhile, Alejandro Garnacho would be worth 31 points per goal and Bruno Fernandes 20.
Notable potential point scorers for Fulham include Rodrigo Muniz (25 points per goal), Raul Jimenez (29 points per goal) and Alex Iwobi (21 points per goal).
Bookings: Frustation to boil over at the Etihad?
The buy price of 26 on the booking points market for Man City vs Plymouth is simply too good to ignore, regardless of what the previous form suggests. Yes, neither side are tracking high on the season-long list for bookings but the longer Plymouth can keep City at bay, the greater the chance of frustration building up in the home ranks.
Even if the match goes as expected and City do run riot, the Plymouth players could quite easily kick out in anger at seeing their cup dream come to an end. For reference, the Pilgrims picked up four bookings alone in their win over Liverpool in the previous round.
Andy is tipster who has been calling Golf tournaments for several years across many different platforms. He has covered all tournaments from the Asian Tour to the Masters. He's also a keen football fan and is an expert on European football.
