Walsall vs Luton Town Predictions

It wasn’t a vintage Boxing Day for the Saddlers, who were beaten in front of a home crowd by Bristol Rovers. However, Dean Keates’ men will know that they were far from outplayed on that occasion, while they also know that they’ve delivered several encouraging performances in front of a home crowd this season, so they probably won’t be feeling too downbeat, even ahead of a match against a very strong Luton side.

As mentioned above, Walsall did lose last time out, but they were a tad unfortunate. It what was essentially a close game, a game that Walsall emerged from with an expected goal difference of -0.08, the Saddlers were much better than the score-line showed.

In addition to being unlucky on Boxing Day, Walsall have delivered some pleasing performances on home soil of late, performances that if replicated would surely allow them to do well on Saturday. The Saddlers delivered a pleasing attacking performance to get the better of Coventry a few weeks ago, clocking an impressive 2.0 expected goals for, while much of the same can be said for when they drew 2-2 (and recorded 2.44 expected goals for) at home against Sunderland prior to that. Moreover, the Saddlers recently went to ABAX Stadium and dominated a useful Peterborough side, so they’ve certainly got it within them to get competitive against the better teams.

The train that is Nathan Jones’ Luton kept on rolling on Boxing Day, stopping at Scunthorpe only to pick up three points. That’s now seven wins on the bounce in League One for the Hatters, who’ve emerged as chief promotion contenders over the last month. However, while they did deserve to come out on top last time out, their victory at Glanford Park wasn’t quite as clear-cut as the score-line suggested. Scunthorpe certainly weren’t without chances on Boxing Day, and had they had their shooting boots on, then Luton could easily have been held to a draw.

Luton are on an extraordinary run of form, but their overall efforts on the road haven’t been as impressive as their efforts at home. Make no mistake about, the Hatters are still useful on their travels, but they look far less infallible.

If we look at the underlying numbers, then we can conclude that Luton have done a bit more away from home than Walsall have at home, as the visitors boast an average expected goal difference of +0.20 on their travels, which is better than Walsall’s of -0.20 at home. That said, such numbers don’t exactly suggest that Luton are worthy of odds-on favouritism.

At the prices, backing ‘Walsall +1 Handicap’ stands out. The Saddlers, who’re not short of the ability to hurt teams at Bescot Stadium, have delivered some pleasing performance against some decent sides of late, while Luton aren’t quite as menacing on the road.