Aston Villa v Cardiff: ‘Unders’ written all over Villa Park clash

Even Christian Benteke’s return to the Aston Villa line-up for the last two Premier League matches hasn’t cured the Villans of their ills in front of goal.

You have to set the time machine dial for September 28th 2013, if you want to find the last time Aston Villa rippled the opposition net in the top-flight.

Ironically, that Andreas Weimann winner was the third Villa goal in just one afternoon as they trumped Manchester City in a true ding-dong battle at Villa Park.

This blank-drawing malaise fully manifested itself in the last match against West Ham, when Benteke was presented with a glorious chance to grab a late winner, but the Premier League’s most trusted forehead could only rattle the crossbar.

When you throw into the mix that Villa’s opponents Cardiff have not scored more than a single goal in their last four Premier League outings – which includes a 0-0 away at Norwich – the under 2.5 goals market looks the best place to visit at 3/4 with Ladbrokes.

This bet would have landed in all of Villa’s last four league outings and two of Cardiff’s, while under 1.5 goals would have paid dividends in two of those four for Villa and both for the visitors – making the 9/4 on this occurrence seem pretty tasty.

Meanwhile, the half-time result looks another area to expose given recent trends. Villa have been drawing at the break in three of their last four Premier League games, while Cardiff’s last three away top-flight games have seen them march down the tunnel level pegging.

Therefore, punters may wish to take the 23/20 on offer that the teams are level after 45 minutes or even the 9/5 on no goals being scored in the first half.

All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing.

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