Watford vs. Crystal Palace Predictions: Back the Hornets to rack up the shots

Watford take on Crystal Palace at Vicarage Road on Wednesday evening in the Premier League and we’ve got our resident tipster @AnthonyEadson on hand with his best bets for the evening’s proceedings. 

The Hornets ended a 12-game winless run with a priceless 1-0 victory away at Aston Villa last weekend. That victory means Watford are now 18th but still inside the relegation zone, four points from safety behind Newcastle and Everton.

Crystal Palace are yet to win a Premier League game in 2022 and have picked up just three points from their last six matches. Patrick Viera’s side went down 1-0 after a late Hakim Ziyech goal gave Chelsea all three points against the Eagles on Saturday, but despite their drop in form over the last couple of months Palace still sit 13th in the league, eight points above the drop.

The stats don’t bode too well for those wanting a high-scoring game on Wednesday with under 2.5 goals landing in six of the home sides last seven league matches. The visitors have also seen a shortage of goals in recent weeks with under 2.5 goals occurring in five of their last six on the road.

I do think we will see a committed performance from Roy Hodgson’s men, with the belief they can make it back-to-back wins for the first time this season. I’ve decided to take Watford to have over 10.5 shots in the match which is currently best priced at 9/10 with Unibet, implying a 52.6% of this bet winning. 

Watford put in a good performance in their victory over Aston Villa and I think they will know the importance of getting at least a point here considering their next three league matches are against Manchester United, Arsenal and Wolves.

With this in mind I can see Hodgson’s side having a real go at Palace. Since the turn of the year, Watford have hit 18 shots away at Newcastle, 11 away at Burnley and 15 at home to Norwich in a game in which they had 10 men for 25 minutes. They average 11.6 shots per game on home soil this season and I do think this is a price we could see shorten considering Betfair and Paddy Power have the same selection priced at just 1/3.

As mentioned above, I think this is a game where we will see a good bit of fight from the rejuvenated hosts after their victory at the weekend which leads me on to my second pick. Ismaila Sarr was shown five yellow cards in the league last season and I think he looks a shade too big to be shown a card against Palace at 13/2 with Bet365. 

Back in the side recently after injury, Sarr was booked in the 1-0 win over Villa and provided the assist for Emmanuel Dennis’ goal. That’s two yellows in 13 appearances this season and the Senegalese forward will be crucial to Watford in these next few months if they are to stay in the division.

Sarr was shown six yellows in his final season in Ligue 1 with Rennes and this term he’s averaged just under a foul a game (0.8). It should be an interesting battle on that side of the pitch with Wilfried Zaha also operating in that vicinity. Zaha is the most fouled player in the division this season, drawing three per game on average and with Sarr just below that at 2.5 fouls per game drawn, it can hopefully lead to some fouls and bookings.

Most other firms have Ismaila Sarr at around 7/2 to be carded on Wednesday evening so I do feel we are getting a little bit of value here considering the importance of this match to Watford. Referee Andre Marriner takes the whistle and although he’s not notoriously one of the greatest officials when it comes to getting the cards out, his yellows per game averages has increased from a measly 2.36 last season to 3.83 in the 2021/2022 season.