Even as Barcelona, Internazionale, Arsenal and Paris Saint-Germain stole our collective attention this week with thrilling second legs of the Champions League semifinals, there’s still a lot to play for in the Premier League. Only 10 of next season’s 36 Champions League places have been confirmed and five teams are battling for the final three spots in England with just three weeks to play.
Football fans can make bets every matchweek at DraftKings Sportsbook. Here are my top betting picks for Matchweek 36.
First, let’s take a look at the full list of fixtures:
Fulham at Everton, 10 a.m. ET, May 10
Brentford at Ipswich Town, 10 a.m. ET, May 10
Manchester City at Southampton, 10 a.m. ET, May 10
Brighton & Hove Albion at Wolves, 10 a.m. ET, May 10
Aston Villa at AFC Bournemouth, 12:30 p.m. ET, May 10
Chelsea at Newcastle United, 7 a.m. ET, May 11
West Ham United at Manchester United, 9:15 a.m. ET, May 11
Leicester City at Nottingham Forest, 9:15 a.m. ET, May 11
Crystal Palace at Tottenham Hotspur, 9:15 a.m. ET, May 11
Arsenal at Liverpool, 11:30 a.m. ET, May 11
Manchester City O3.5 Goals (+155)
It’s been a relatively disappointing season for both sides of Manchester, but unfortunately for Southampton fans, that makes the prognosis of this game even more grim than it already would’ve been. City — and, frankly, Southampton — must’ve hoped that this game would mean nothing and that it had already clinched the title by now. Though they are no longer in the title fight, the Cityzens have a European place to protect, just four points ahead of seventh-place Aston Villa. Even games against teams as bad as the Saints mean something, and Pep Guardiola’s men will take this one seriously.
Then look at the form table: there’s been exactly one team to take 13 points from their last five league games, and it’s none other the blue side of Manchester. Their wins have been fairly impressive: a 5-2 drubbing of a Crystal Palace side that they will meet in the FA Cup final on May 17, 2-0 wins over Everton and Nottingham Forest, a 2-1 result against Villa, and a 1-0 triumph over red-hot Wolves. Meanwhile, the Saints have taken just two points in their last 12 matches and are on pace to tie Derby County for the worst season in league history. Losing 2-0 to fellow relegation fodder Leicester City in Matchweek 35 is downright embarrassing, as is conceding nearly 2.5 goals per match across the season as Southampton has.
The cherry on top? Erling Haaland hasn’t played in more than a month after suffering an ankle injury in the team’s March 30 FA Cup win over Bournemouth. He’s finally fit for tomorrow’s match, although Guardiola hasn’t yet decided whether or not he’ll start. Start or not, City is flying, and Saints’ miserable season will continue.
Morgan Rogers to Score or Give Assist (+150)
While Aston Villa still technically has a chance of making a run at a Champions League place, it absolutely has to win out, given that it sits three points behind the Blues in fifth and one point behind Forest, which has an easy game against Leicester City this weekend. The Villans will need all of their players to step up, not just Rogers and not just their talisman between the sticks, Emi Martínez.
So far, they have; with 15 points its last six league matches, Villa is in better form than any team besides City. Rogers has had a goal contribution in four of his last six matches, even though he’s been held off the score sheet in his past two, and he’s the most reliable of any of the Villa starters I considered. Marco Asensio has slowed down somewhat after his hot start with the club, and Ollie Watkins hasn’t started consistently enough, yet both of those players have lower goal contribution odds than Rogers does.
Bournemouth, one place behind Villa in the table but seven points adrift, is making a run at a Conference League spot, which is likely to go to the eighth-placed team in the Premier League this season, given that Newcastle is almost certain to qualify for either a Champions League or Europa league place. But the Cherries have slowed down in form since the start of February, with four wins, five draws, and six losses in all competitions since then. A 2-1 win over Arsenal in Matchweek 35 was a step in the right direction, but the defense has still conceded two or more goals seven times over that span, so it should be a good opportunity for Rodgers to notch a goal contribution.
Chelsea Moneyline (+210)
This is probably the biggest game of the week, given that both of these teams are in the morass of five fighting for three places. There’s not much that has separated these two teams this season; they’ve both managed 63 points and a plus-21 goal differential. Newcastle has scored four more goals than the Blues — there’s a reason why Enzo Maresca has long been tied with striker Victor Osimhen, the front-man for Turkish outfit Galatasaray and the Nigerian national team — but over the course of a long season, that’s not much. The teams have split their two games so far, with Chelsea winning in the league and the Magpies returning the favor in the fourth round of the Carabao Cup, which they went on to win.
The Blues actually rank slightly higher in the form table despite an inconsistent season, having taken 11 points from their last five games and, along with City and Brentford, they’re one of just three teams in the Premier League on an active three-game winning streak. Newcastle had a series of awesome results to climb into the European picture, winning five straight between Matchweeks 28 and 32, but it took a bad 4-1 loss to Villa in Matchweek 33, only beat Ipswich Town 3-0 in Matchweek 34 (no, seriously, that’s a bad result against the Tractor Boys), and needed an Alexander Isak 89th-minute penalty just to beat a mediocre Brighton side last weekend.
Perhaps I’m overrating Chelsea’s 5-1 domination over two legs of Swedish outfit Djurgårdens in the Europa Conference League semifinal, given that Djurgårdens’ roster has a collective value of 21.68 million Euros, compared to the Blues’ 922 million, but I thought they looked fairly convincing across those two legs. They also beat Liverpool, 3-1, last weekend, and while the Reds only brought on Dominik Szoboszlai and Alexis Mac Allister in the 69th minute, any win over a team featuring Mohamed Salah, Virgil Van Dijk, and Alisson is a good one. I’m not positive that Chelsea will come out on top in this critical tie, but I like the value at +210.
