Friday Football Tips: Back French fouls fancy at 7/2 | OneFootball

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Takumi Minamino: Former Liverpool man is now at Monaco

Fouls looks the order of the day in Friday's Ligue 1 clash and our Bet Builder has a 7/2 Bet Builder for the Toulouse v Monaco showdown...

Toulouse v MonacoFriday 7 March, 19:45

I'm going down the fouls route in Friday night's Ligue 1 game.

We've got two of the division's top five for committing fouls and two of the top six for fouls drawn. Monaco are second on both metrics, while both sides are going well chasing respective European qualification goals - this is a big game.

There's also a referee who is well above the average in Ligue 1 when it comes to fouls per game - Marc Bollengier's figure of 26.17 is also two whole points above the league average as a whole.

My approach is to target the regular foulers and I've settled on heading to the 'to commit 1+ foul' market where I'm going to back five players using their fouls data and their likely opponents.

Legs 1, 2 & 3: Sierro, Donnum & McKenzie each to commit 1+ foul

Starting with Toulouse, let's side with Vincent Sierro, Aron Donnum and Mark McKenzie.

Sierro has committed a foul in his last nine starts and the central midfielder may well have foul magnet Breel Embolo to deal with - the Swiss international has been playing 'in the hole' between the midfield and the front man of late.

Centre-back McKenzie will also have to watch that threat, as well as centre forward Mika Biereth, another of Monaco's most-fouled players. He's landed the 1+ foul bet in eight of his last 10 appearances.

And Donnum is another who looks good for at least one foul. He's managed that in 15 of his last 19 appearances. While he can play on either side, he started on the left last week and that would likely put him up against the oft-fouled Maghnes Akliouche.

Turning to Monaco, Akliouche is worth backing to commit a foul. He's done that in seven of his last 10 and it's worth noting that one of the misses saw him depart injured inside 20 minutes.

His likely battle with Donnum should produce fouls as his Norwegian opponent has drawn multiple fouls in 11 of his last 16 starts. There's a chance Donnum may not be there but if he's replaced by Yann Gboho - just back from injury - that would suit just fine as he's the most-fouled Toulouse player by some distance on both the fouls-per-90 and per-game listings.

Finally, former Liverpool man Takumi Minamino is added to the Bet Builder. He's committed a foul in seven of his last nine starts.

Playing the '10' role seems likely to put him in Cristian Casseres' area of the pitch and he's another of the visitors' most-fouled men.

OK, having five different players in a Bet Builder clearly carries risk - for starters, you may want to wait for the team news to see if they all make the XIs.

And, yes, I can already see a scenario where four of the five legs win and we're left hanging.

Still, I do feel all the ducks line up here and in the absence of a decent fixture list on Friday, I'll play the five-fold which pays just north of 7/2.

Recommended bets

Back Vincent Sierro, Aron Donnum, Mark McKenzie, Maghnes Akliouche & Takumi Minamino to commit 1+ foul each @ around 7/2

Column P/L 2024/25

Staked: 233pts Returned: 261.1pts 2024/25 P/L: +28.1pts

2023/24 P/L: +16.78pts 2022/23 P/L: +68.69pts