Premiership Predictions 31 March – 2 April
Third placed Arsenal will be looking to continue their recent form after a run of seven victories left the Gunners three points ahead of North London rivals Tottenham in the race for automatic Champions League qualification.
Arsene Wenger’s side has scored 20 goals in their last seven games and Arsenal have increasingly shown they are capable of scoring goals without Robin Van Persie, with Arteta, Song and in particular Theo Walcott demonstrating good form recently.
Opponents Queens Park Rangers have won just once in eight Premier League games and Mark Hughes’ side have a difficult fixture run-in from now until the end of the season with away trips to Manchester United, Chelsea and Manchester City coming up.
Premier League top goalscorer Robin Van Persie has not gone three games without a goal all season and the odds of 3.75 on Van Persie to score first, are worth considering especially as QPR have not kept a clean sheet in the league for 21 games.Van Persie also scored in the reverse in December, which Arsenal won 1-0.
Arsenal have picked up clean sheets in their last two Premier League games and with Djibril Cisse again suspended for QPR, the Gunners should continue their momentum and pick up another valuable three points on Saturday.
Arsenal -1 Asian Handicap @1.90
Sixth meets seventh in the Premier League as Newcastle welcome Liverpool to the Sports Direct Arena and the Magpies will be looking to maintain their eight point advantage over Kenny Dalglish’s side.
Alan Pardew’s side have been performing above expectations this season and the pace and power of the all-Senegalese strike-force of Demba Ba and Papiss Cisse are proving to be a real handful for in the Premier League.
Despite Liverpool’s cup runs, the tale in the league is an altogether different story. At Anfield Liverpool have won just five games all season and the Reds have now lost five of their last six games in the league.
Fabricio Coloccini misses this game with a hamstring injury, so the makeshift centre back partnership of Mike Williamson and James Perch looks set to resume at the back for Newcastle.
The last eight meetings between these two sides have had over 2.5 goals and goals for both sides seem a possibility.
Over 2.5 goals (Newcastle v Liverpool) @1.85