In this section you’ll find our free football betting tips which cover a selection of the best matches from today, tomorrow and this weekend. The predictions made by our tipsters focus on value and can easily be combined into accumulators. The predictions & tips mainly focus on domestic games with a heavy slant towards the Premier League and Championship, plus major international fixtures.
Upcoming Football Matches
15:00 - Celtic v Aberdeen
This match has been postponed.
Champions Celtic entertain Aberdeen at Celtic Park in a tasty Scottish Premiership fixture on Saturday afternoon. The Hoops will be looking for another handsome win on home soil. On the opening weekend of the new season earlier in the month, Neil Lennon’s boys started with a big 5-1 victory over Hamilton Academical at Celtic Park – will we see something similar on Saturday?
Celtic picked up their ninth successive Scottish Premiership title last season, beating rivals Rangers to first place by a whopping 13 points. They were imperious at home, winning a staggering 14 of 15 at Celtic Park. This will be Aberdeen’s first away game of the season, and it will no doubt be a tough test for Derek McInnes’ men. We fancy the Celts to pick up an easy three points. Back the hosts to win -2.
17:30 - Hibernian v Motherwell
Saturday’s late game in the Scottish Premiership takes place at Easter Road, as Jack Ross’ Hibernian and Stephen Robinson’s Motherwell square off. Hibs can be a tough nut to crack on their own patch, but only Celtic and Rangers picked up more away points than the Steelmen in last season’s Premiership. This promises to be an entertaining match in the Scottish capital.
Hibernian have started their season well, beating Kilmarnock 2-1, Livingston 4-1 and Dundee United 1-0. Motherwell finished third in the Premiership last term and had a cracking campaign, but they have started this season with defeats to Ross County and Dundee Utd, securing their first points of the season in midweek with a 2-2 home draw with Livingston. The Hibees will be hoping to continue their good start with another three points at the weekend. Have a punt on the hosts to get the win at very solid looking odds of 11/10.
20:00 - Manchester City v Lyon
Manchester City’s quest to win their first UEFA Champions League continues at the weekend. On Saturday night at the Estadio Jose Alvalade in Lisbon, Pep Guardiola’s men take on Rudi Garcia’s Lyon in the quarter-finals. Man City are the strong favourites to get the win and go through, but the French outfit shocked Juventus in the previous round despite being a little rusty due to French football’s early finish. Who will prevail in Portugal’s capital?
The Citizens have been solid in the Champions League so far. In the Round of 16, City beat Spanish champions Real Madrid 4-2 on aggregate, winning 2-1 at the Santiago Bernabeu and 2-1 at the Etihad Stadium and totally deserving both results. Lyon beat Juve on away goals in the previous round, but this will surely be a step too far for the Ligue 1 side. You can get Man City to win both halves at the generous price of 6/4.
16:30 - Livingston v Rangers
Steven Gerrard’s Rangers make the trip to the Tony Macaroni Arena to play Gary Holt’s Livingston in the Scottish Premiership on Sunday afternoon. The Gers have made a solid start to the 2020-21 season, winning 1-0 at Aberdeen on the opening weekend of the new campaign. Will the Glasgow giants be too strong for Livi in West Lothian at the weekend?
Rangers were solid away from home last term, winning 10 of 15 away league matches, though if they are to push for the title there is certainly room for improvement. They netted 31 and shipped just 12 along the way. Having started this season with an away victory, the Gers will be eyeing up another three points on the road this Sunday. The Livi Lions have had a tough start, and this will be another stern test for Holt’s boys, one that we feel will prove too much. Have a punt on Rangers to win to nil at decent odds of 13/10.
20:00 - Sevilla v Manchester United
Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s Manchester United continue their 2019-20 UEFA Europa League campaign with a semi final fixture against competition specialists, Julen Lopetegui’s Sevilla on Sunday. This semi will be a one-off tie played at the RheinEnergieStadion in Cologne, Germany. The winners will take on either Inter Milan or Shakhtar Donetsk in the 2020 Europa League final on August 21st.
Sevilla – who have won the Europa League a record five times – beat Nuno Espirito Santo’s Wolverhampton Wanderers in Duisburg in the previous round. Lucas Ocampos’ late goal gave the Spanish side a 1-0 win. United also won 1-0 in their quarter final, with Bruno Fernandes’ extra time penalty doing the business against Copenhagen. This semi could go either way on Sunday, but we fancy the Red Devils to edge it and go through to the final. The Man Utd victory is available at odds that we feel are just about big enough so take the 11/8.
20:00 - Inter Milan v Shakhtar Donetsk
Antonio Conte’s Inter Milan and Luis Castro’s Shakhtar Donetsk square off in a UEFA Europa League semi final at the Merkur Spiel-Arena in Dusseldorf, Germany on Monday night. The winners of this one-off tie will take on either Sevilla or Manchester United in the Cologne final on August 21st. Inter, who are the favourites to lift the trophy, will fancy their chances of getting the job done in Dusseldorf but this is a Shakhtar side that has goals in it.
Conte’s men have been strong in the knockout stages after dropping in from the UEFA Champions League, seeing off Ludogorets Razgrad, Getafe and Bayer Leverkusen to reach the last four. Shakhtar thumped Basel 4-1 in Gelsenkirchen in the last eight, but this could be a tough night for the Ukrainian champions, who on the UEFA Cup, as it was then, back in 2009. Check out the tempting price of 12/5 for Inter to win and both teams to score in what could be a thrilling clash.
UPDATE: Football Resumptions, Postponements & Cancellations
Football leagues in England, Spain and Italy all resume in June though elsewhere in Europe there had been a return to action. The German Bundesliga was the first of the major leagues to return followed by Portugal, Austria, Denmark and Poland amongst others.
ENGLISH LEAGUES
With nine rounds of fixtures left to play, the Premier League had to step aside in March but will now resume on Wednesday the 17th June. The initial return date was April 4th, but the postponement was extended. Similar applies to the Championship, with a return set for Saturday the 20th June.
Clubs in League One, League Two and the National League voted to end their seasons early. Automatic promotion and relegation was decided on a points per game basis with Leagues One and Two holding the traditional four team promotion playoffs for the remaining spot. League Two playoffs begin on the 18th June, League One on the 3rd July.
OTHER LEAGUES
As mentioned above, Germany was the first nation to return to action, with the Bundesliga and Bundesliga II resuming on the 16th May, albeit behind closed doors.
Italy have allowed matches to be played from the 12th June. Spain’s La Liga returned on June 11th set. The SPFL, French Ligue 1 and the Dutch Eredivisie will not complete their seasons.
The Champions and Europa Leagues remain suspended “until further notice”, but UEFA chiefs are continuing to plan a return for the tournaments once the domestic situation becomes clearer for all involved.
There were the odd exceptions to these suspension, with some matches in Australia, Nigeria, Belarus and one or two other nations still going ahead. Some of those will be played without spectators so all in all it really was very slim pickings for football fans over the last weeks and months.
EURO 2020 DELAYED TO 2021
In addition to all that, UEFA Euro 2020 has been postponed until 2021 in the hope that this will allow the European leagues to finish their domestic seasons over the now-free summer. The semi-finals of the play-offs (to decide the final four teams at the Euros), which were due to take place in March, have also been postponed, with those now pencilled in for June and the four finals to follow at some stage after that.
OTHER INTERNATIONAL MATCHES & CUPS
The 2020 Copa America has also been delayed for 12 months and various international friendly games that were scheduled to take place have been cancelled. That includes the likes of England v Italy (March 27) and England v Romania, which wasn’t due to be played until the 7th June.
Football Bets
Our tips and predictions mainly focus on a few core bets. Chances are you’re already familiar with these, but here’s a quick run down just in case:
- Win/Draw/Win – The simplest bet you can make… who will win the match?
- HT/FT – The odds for the WDW markets are often quite low, especially when one team is heavily favoured. The halft-time/full-time market offers an opportunity to boost the odds by selecitng the result for both half time and the final whistle.
- Handicap Betting – Another way to increase the odds on the match result is to add a handicap. For example, Arsenal -2 means that they effectively start the match at -2, meaning they need two goals more than the other team to draw and three more to win.
- Both Teams to Score – Originating in the Goals Galore market from Betfred, both teams to score has become incredibly popular. They frequently show up in accumulators and with odds usually below evens it’s easy to see why. Other variations you may see in our tips are both teams not to score (BTTS No – where one or both teams won’t score) and BTTS + Win, where the winner of the match is picked alongside the BTTS bet.
- Over/Under – Another bet that’s along the same lines as BTTS are over/under bets. Except here you’re predicting whether the totaly number of goals will be above or below a target figure. The most comon example is 2.5 goals, although you can place these bets on a wide range of numbers. You can even bet on over 0.5 goals if you think it’s going to be anything other than a 0-0 draw.
- Correct Score – To really boost the odds, head to the correct score market. It’s a hard bet to predict but it sometimes has value.
- Goalscorer – You wont see these bets too frequently in our tips, but they do crop up from time to time if the value offered is good. Here we’re picking who will score, either first, last or at any point in the match. For matches with a heavy favourite and a strong striker you may even see something along the lines of “Ronaldo to score two or more goals”.