Crystal Palace vs Liverpool Odds, Pick | Premier League Betting Analysis (Feb. 25)
Marc Atkins/Getty. Pictured: Mohamed Salah.
Crystal Palace vs Liverpool Odds
Crystal Palace Odds | +350 |
Liverpool Odds | -135 |
| Draw | +275 |
| Over/Under | 2.5 (-125 / -105) |
| Both Teams to Score (Yes/No) | (-135 / +105) |
| Odds via Caesars. Get the latest soccer odds here. | |
Liverpool look to rebound from an embarrassing loss to Real Madrid in the Champions League when they travel to Selhurst Park to take on Crystal Palace.
Palace are coming off back to back draws with Brighton and Brentford where they did not look like the better side. This fixture has some history to it, as Palace famously erased a three goal deficit late in the second half to sink Liverpool's title hopes in 2014, which has been dubbed "Crystanbul."
Crystal Palace are sitting comfortably in the middle of the table, but a few bad results and they could find themselves in the relegation fight.
Liverpool's Champions League & FA Cup hopes are dead, so the Reds must now shift their focus to the Premier League and battle for a top four spot. Their underlying metrics show they are due for some positive regression, but the defense has completely let them down this season and is showing no signs of improvement.
Crystal Palace Struggling For Attacking Form
Since the World Cup break, Crystal Palace have created just 7.8 xG in nine matches. They were able to create a big scoring chance against Brentford last weekend, but outside of that one chance, they did next to nothing. They did give Liverpool all sorts of problems on the counterattack when these two met at Anfield, but that was in August and a lot has changed since then.
For the season, they have been very poor in the final third, as Palace are only averaging 0.88 npxG per 90 minutes and have created just 14 big scoring chances.
Crystal Palace have also been really bad on the defensive end this season, allowing 1.39 npxG per 90 minutes, which is 14th in the Premier League. The Eagles are also 18th in big scoring chances allowed, 14th in box entries allowed and 19th in xThreat allowed. With that bad of a defense going up against one of the best offenses in the Premier League, don't be surprised if Liverpool puts the ball in the back of the net multiple times.
Additionally, Crystal Palace are dealing with a lot of injuries in their defense as Joel Ward is out and Chris Richards and Joakim Anderson are both questionable.
Liverpool's Woes a Reverse of Palace
The Liverpool defense is in absolute shambles right now and all of the underlying numbers suggest that it’s not going to get better anytime soon.
The Reds are allowing 1.43 xG per 90 minutes and out of the World Cup break they have allowed 11.7 xG in nine matches.
Their offense is still one of the best in the Premier League. Liverpool are averaging 1.81 npxG per 90 minutes and out of the World Cup break, they have created 15.7 xG in eight matches, but have only scored nine goals in the Premier League.
It looks like Darwin Nunez is going to be out, but maybe the best news that Liverpool could have gotten is Diogo Jota is back and healthy. We forget how important he was to Liverpool last season, when he put up a 0.84 xG + xA per 90 minute rate, which was second on the team behind only Mo Salah. For the first 30 minutes against Real Madrid they showed a great ability to break down a 4-4-2 low block, as they created over 2 xG and three big scoring chances.
Even going back a little bit further, they created over 2 xG against Sean Dyche’s Everton. What Liverpool did in that match is utilize their center backs as ball carriers to break the first line of defense when teams are passive against them.
It worked against Everton and caused them to create more space in between the lines. However, it also requires your defensive midfielders and full backs to be good in transition defense, which Liverpool are not right now. So, that could be an area where Crystal Palace can exploit them.
Crystal Palace vs Liverpool Pick
The Crystal Palace offense is bad right now, there is no sugarcoating it. The Eagles are second to last in xG per match and second to last in xThreat. They are, however, 10th in final third to penalty box conversion rate, which tells me they have been decent in transition offense.
Palace's defense has been bad all season long and they’ve actually been worse at home than they’ve been on the road. The Eagles are allowing 1.43 xG per match at Selhurst Park this season and just conceded 2.5 xG to Brighton the last time they were at home.
I have no doubts about Liverpool's ability to create chances against Crystal Palace's low block, but their defense is still showing no signs of improvement, which I think will lead to high scoring affair.
I projected 3.51 goals for this match, so I like the value on the over 2.5 at -125.
Pick: Over 2.5 goals (-125)
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