We have gone through the betting for the outright market and the one for the top goalscorer for the new 2022-23 Sky Bet Championship season and before the campaign gets underway in Huddersfield on Friday evening there is just enough time to look at the various side markets that have been priced up.
We have markets such as promotion and relegation to consider as well as various finishing position offerings. There are also some geographical markets priced up as well. Having gone through them all there are two bets that I like.
Relegation
Last year the relegation market was hard to bet on because Derby County were effectively doomed before they started but this year there are no points deductions heading into the campaign so in theory the three worst teams are going to be relegated. Whenever you look at a relegation market the natural thing to do is look at who came up. Wigan Athletic won Sky Bet League One last season and they were only in the third tier because of a deduction of their own which saw them relegated from this league so you think they’ll be fine. The resources Sunderland have should mean they stay up easily but Rotherham are a typical yoyo team who could well occupy a relegation spot. They are priced up that way though.
That still leaves two spots open and while it is natural to fear for the likes of Birmingham, Reading and Hull City, who all would have been much closer to the drop but for deductions last season, I like a bit of value in my outright bets and the value in this market looks to be Huddersfield Town. There is a school of thought that a team who overachieves are always more vulnerable the season after and Barnsley showed that perfectly last season and you have to say there are some serious similarities between Barnsley and Huddersfield, not least their geographical location.
Barnsley lost their manager after making the play-offs and Huddersfield have done the same. Key players left Oakwell and in Harry Toffolo and Lewis O’Brien the same has happened with Huddersfield and both teams appointed rookie managers. The one thing Huddersfield have to contend with that Barnsley didn’t is the loss of parachute payments so they have to run a much tighter ship this season and I fear the worst from them accordingly. I thought Huddersfield overachieved last season anyway and a lot of numbers backed that up. Without key players and under a rookie manager it isn’t going to take a lot for Huddersfield to follow their Yorkshire rivals lead and head down to League One.
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Top Half Finish
I nailed a decent price for the accumulators in the top half finish market last season and I’ll pick out another this season in the form of Preston North End, a team who don’t really need to improve too much from them finishing 13th in the last campaign.
I really like their coach Ryan Lowe who plays football the right way and he clearly has some big contacts in the game not least Steven Gerrard so he gets top level loans. He had Cameron Archer from Aston Villa last season and has taken Ben Woodburn from Liverpool this time around. Preston improved immeasurably under Lowe last season and I expect a similar improvement under him now he has had a full pre-season with his squad and got the squad he wants. 7/4 for them to improve just one position when the likes of Huddersfield, Blackburn and QPR are expected to struggle more than they did last season.
Tips
Back Huddersfield to be relegated for a 2/10 stake at 7.50 with Bet365
Back Preston Top Half Finish for a 3/10 stake at 2.75 with Unibet
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