Four ‘what if’ predictions for the Carabao Cup Cup quarter-finals
The Carabao Cup is reaching the business stage with eight teams left battling it out in the quarter-finals.
Liverpool are the holders but they were knocked out by Manchester City in the fourth round, with Pep Guardiola’s side looking to win the EFL Cup for the fifth time in six seasons. Alongside Man City are six other Premier League sides, with Charlton Athletic waving the flag for the Football League.
So that means we’ve got three all-Premier League ties across the two days of quarter-finals, with Man City facing Southampton, Newcastle hosting Leicester and Wolves travelling to face Nottingham Forest. Charlton have the hard task of travelling to Old Trafford for the quarter-final against Manchester United.
Despite there being just four games this week, kickoffs aren’t spread out with two games running at the same time on Tuesday, and two overlapping on Wednesday. So keeping track is a tricky endeavour, but with the new Squawka Live app, you will be kept constantly in the loop.
Squawka Live not only allows you to keep track of the latest scores and your favourite teams but also brings stats to the small screen, providing real-time updates so you never miss a beat.
With the Alerts feature you can also preset triggers that will notify you if specific in-play events such as match time, odds changes and goals/points happen. So we’ve come up with five matches for you to follow with predictions and which triggers will come in useful to track your options.
How to use Squawka Live's Alert triggers
With Squawka Live's Alert triggers, you can preset triggers that will notify you if specific in-play events occur. To set up your own triggers, follow the steps below.
- Download the Squawka Live app on the App Store or Google Play (here's the link). Currently, the app is available in the UK only.
- Find your selected live event and navigate to the Alerts tab.
- Click on create your first Alert and select a specific trigger.
- Select the event detail you want to receive a notification for.
- The Alert will be added to your home screen and you will be notified when your chosen event has occurred.
Man Utd vs Charlton
The trigger: Match time: Less than 10 mins
The prediction: Man Utd to win to nil
Charlton have been the story of the EFL Cup this season, as the last non-Premier League team left in the tournament and London’s only representatives after the third round. But many expect their journey to end at Old Trafford.
Man Utd may be one of just two sides not to score in the opening 10 minutes of a Premier League match this season, often slow starters, but they have a formidable record at Old Trafford of late. The Red Devils have won each of their last eight home games across all competitions, keeping six clean sheets during that run.
Therefore, we’re recommending that you set a ‘trigger’ to alert you when the 10-minute mark chimes to place your bet on Man Utd to win to nil. Odds will be pretty low to start off with, just if the score is 0-0, they are likely to have increased.
Newcastle vs Leicester
The trigger: Match time: Between 30 minutes and half-time
The prediction: Newcastle to score next
Talking of slow starters, Newcastle haven’t been giving their fans much to cheer for in the opening 30 minutes of their games, despite their excellent season. The Magpies are third in the Premier League and may look at the EFL Cup as a chance to win silverware for the first time in a long while.
But 81% of their Premier League goals this season have come after the 31st minute, and 31% in the final final minutes before half-time. So our trigger is for the match time to hit between 30 minutes and half-time. For this, you can either back Newcastle to score net or for them to score before half-time if you fancy what will be slightly bigger odds.
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Nottingham Forest vs Wolves
The trigger: Under 2.5 goals reaches selected odds
The prediction: Under 2.5 goals
Sorry to fans of Nottingham Forest and Wolves, but of the four EFL Cup quarter-finals, this is possibly the least appealing to the neutral. Both sides are struggling in the Premier League and are the lowest two scorers in the top flight, with Wolves netting 11 times and Forest 13.
Despite scoring twice at Anfield on Saturday, Wolves don’t regularly score more than once on the road, doing so just twice in their 10 away games across all competitions this season. On the other side of the coin, Brentford are the only away side to score 2+ goals at the City Ground in Nottingham Forest’s past six home matches.
For this, we’re recommending the Under 2.5 goals bet and using the trigger to let us know when the odds are high enough.
Southampton vs Man City
The trigger: Team difference: Draw
The prediction: Man City to win
The final quarter-final sees Man City travel to face Southampton, and many expect this to go only one way. Southampton are bottom of the Premier League and have lost five of their 11 home games across all competitions this season – but two of those games were wins against League One opposition in the EFL Cup. So against Premier League opposition they’ve won one, drawn three and lost five of nine.
The question for most will be how long to Southampton hold out, and that’s what we’ll be tracking. As we edge towards the final 15 minutes of the half, if the score remains level, then that’s the moment we’d be looking to make our claim. In the Premier League this season, Man City have scored more goals than any other side in the 15 minutes before half-time, while Southampton have conceded more goals in that same period. Man City also netted twice between 30 and 45 minutes in their 4-0 win over Chelsea on Sunday.
