Championship betting tips: Fulham v Middlesbrough best bets and preview
Joe Rindl has two best bets as promotion favourites Fulham face a tricky Sky Bet Championship opener against Middlesbrough.
Football betting tips: Fulham v Middlesbrough
1pt Aleksandar Mitrovic to score and Fulham to win at 21/10 (Sky Bet)
1pt Aleksandar Mitrovic to score first at 15/4 (Bet365, Betway)
I an in firm agreement with Jake Osgathorpe who, in his Championship outright preview, strongly backed Fulham to get promoted and immediately return to the Premier League.
The Cottagers are being led by former Hull, Watford and Everton boss Marco Silva, who replaced Scott Parker in July.
While he may be remembered as a ‘failure’ at Everton, leaving in December 2019, Jake argued that based on expected goals (xG), he was actually extremely unlucky with results in his second season.
Silva inherits a Fulham’s side which is largely unchanged from the team that earned promotion from the Championship in 2019/20. It’s a squad that still includes Aleksandar Mitrovic, who scored 26 goals that term.
The Infogol model has Fulham as favourites to go up. That’ll be the number one target as they start the long road back to the top flight at home to Middlesbrough in front of the TV cameras on Sunday.
Kick-off time: 13:30 BST, Sunday
TV channel: Sky Sports Football
Fulham 10/11 | Draw 12/5 | Middlesbrough 16/5
How will Middlesbrough do this season?
Neil Warnock begins his second full season in charge of Middlesbrough and after nine top-half finishes from their past 11 Championship campaigns, surely Boro can push on this year and make it into the top six.
The Yorkshire club may have finished 10th last term, 13 points off the play-offs, but Infogol labelled them as underachievers. On expected points, Boro should have been sixth.
My concern ahead of this campaign though is goals. Finding the net has been a recurring issue and question marks remain around former Wycombe forward Uche Ikpeazu who will be asked to fill the void left by Britt Assombalonga, who departed this summer.
Ex-Forest and Newcastle striker Sammy Ameobi is also a new arrival, but he has yet to feature in pre-season due to an ongoing knee injury.
Back Fulham and Mitrovic
Fulham have also made strides in the transfer market with Paulo Gazzaniga set to make his debut in goal and Harry Wilson another great buy from Liverpool.
Silva fielded a strong line-up in Fulham’s final pre-season match - a 1-0 win over Charlton last week - which could be an indicator to their line-up against Boro, with Mitrovic, Neeskens Kebano and Anthony Knockaert all starting.
Fulham’s side is incredibly strong for the Championship and I’m not surprised to see them odds-on favourites for this fixture.
I’m expecting Mitrovic to hit the ground running too. The Serb may have scored only 11 goals in 40 appearances last term, but in the Championship he’s formidable. The 26-year-old also starts brightly - he netted five goals in six matches in August in the second tier two seasons ago.
At 7/2 with Sky Bet and William Hill, MITROVIC TO SCORE FIRST looks very appealing.
If, like me, you expect Fulham to collect all three points, then MITROVIC TO SCORE AND FULHAM TO WIN at 21/10 also shouldn't be missed.
Fulham v Middlesbrough best bets and score prediction
- 1pt Mitrovic to score and Fulham to win at 21/10 (Sky Bet)
- 1pt Mitrovic to score first at 7/2 (Sky Bet, William Hill)
Score prediction: Fulham 2-0 Middlesbrough (Sky Bet odds: 15/2)
Odds correct at 1400 BST (05/08/21)
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