Donna Vekic v Karolina Pliskova
WTA Brisbane – 9.00 am
BT Sport
One of the early features of Saturday’s sporting action is the semi-finals from WTA Brisbane. I featured Pliskova on Friday as she took on Johanna Konta’s conqueror Ajla Tomljanovic in the quarterfinals. Pliskova got through it but only after dropping the second set. But she turned the class back on in the deciding set to set up this cash with Vekic. This is important early season form for Pliskova, given the upcoming Australian Open.
Vekic has had a strong run as well in Brisbane. She has only dropped the one set in her three matches at the tournament so far. Her notable win along the way was knocking out sixth seed Kiki Bertens. Pliskova for reference, is the fifth seed. Pliskova leads the head to head 2-0 against Vekic. Their most recent meeting was last year out in Japan. Each of the previous meetings has gone to three sets and the top bookmakers have this tense semi-final showdown at 11/8 to go the same way.
Manchester United v Reading
FA Cup – 12.30 pm
BT Sport
The FA Cup action at Old Trafford on the weekend will see Red Devils interim manager Ole Gunnar Solskjaer targeting this fifth straight win. It has been a strong start for the biggest managerial job of his career. But there have been favourable games in there for United. This on paper has the look of being a fairly comfortable tie too for the Red Devils at home. My recommendation for this feature in Saturday’s Best Bets of the Day is going to be, get creative.
Think clean sheets. Think correct score. Asian Handicaps. That kind of thing. Reading are in a pile of trouble second from bottom in the Championship. They have won only one away game all season. The Royals have failed to score in five of their last six games on the road too. The leading bookmakers have United at around 4/7 odds-on to win to nil. But then, there’s the magic of the FA Cup and it’s unlikely the Red Devils are going to bother sending out a full strength side. So while perhaps Reading aren’t going to enjoy themselves, you wonder if they could simply dig in and frustrate their hosts to a replay. They will see that payday as a win.
Leicester v Gloucester
Premiership Rugby – 3.00 pm
BT Sport
Even though the Tigers are starting down in ninth place in the Premiership heading into the weekend, they are actually only four points away from the top four. So it’s all pretty tight in that middle section in the division. The Tigers could give themselves a huge lift at Welford Road on the weekend. Leicester won their last home game which was against Harlequins, who are sat up in fourth place. That is their only win in their last five league games though. But the Tigers are taking on third-placed Gloucester here and Leicester have remained undefeated on home soil since 2007 against the Cherry & Whites.
But Gloucester have reason to be confident as well. That is because they have won back to back meetings with the Tigers, albeit on home soil at Kingsholm. The most recent one was back at the start of October. So I can see this being a great encounter between the two sides. Each of the last four games that the Cherry & Whites have been involved in has actually ended in an away win. They lost last time out at home against Sale so they will be looking to pick themselves up after that. Gloucester hasn’t lost back to back Premiership games since 2016 and they are 6/4 with top bookmakers to pull off the win in opposition to the 4/7 odds-on quote that the Tigers are at.
Blackpool v Arsenal
FA Cup – 5.30 pm
BT Sport
The Seasiders get a wonderful home draw in the third round of the FA Cup. This will be the second meeting between Blackpool and Arsenal this season. The League One side suffered a narrow 2-1 defeat at the Emirates in the EFL Cup and gave a really good account of themselves. While they are completely out of form at the moment with no win in their last six played (D2 L4) they basically have nothing to lose at Bloomfield Road. Arsenal was nowhere near full strength for that EFL Cup clash with Blackpool back in October and they aren’t likely to be on the weekend.
With Arsenal having already shown plenty of vulnerability in the defensive area of their game this season, is there a hint of a FA Cup upset? The Blackpool – Draw Double Chance is at 11/4 with leading bookmakers and a draw would be considered an upset. Or will it simply be the case of the superior firepower of the Gunners once again finding a way to do enough against the plucky Seasiders? The Gunners have to have learned their lessons after crashing out of last season’s third-round against Nottingham Forest.
