Thursday’s props column has a Bet Builder treble built around Real Sociedad’s impeccable defensive home record as they face Barcelona.
There’s an intriguing La Liga clash on Thursday night for us to look at, as Barcelona travel to Real Sociedad with European places on the line.
Barca suffered a shock home defeat against Cadiz on Monday and badly need a response to keep pace in what is a tight race for the top four.
Xavi’s side are third, a point behind Atletico with two games in hand on Diego Simeone’s side, and level on points with fourth-placed Sevilla with one game in hand.
Sociedad, for their part, are in sixth but only five points behind Barca so a home win here would suddenly catapult them into the Champions League race.
They haven’t managed to beat any of the top four this season yet though (D3 L3) but this could be their chance with Barca having a major wobble.
Scoring goals is the crucial issue here, as Sociedad’s defence has been a Basque brick wall at home and they’ve not conceded a home league goal yet in 2022.
That’s seven straight clean sheets for Real Sociedad at home in La Liga, yielding two draws and five wins – four 1-0s and a 2-0 success.
They’ve not kept a clean sheet at home to Barca since 2016 and the last five meetings here have all gone over 2.5 goals, but Sociedad have been the masters of low-scoring games this season.
Real Sociedad have conceded just six home goals in La Liga this season – mind you they’ve only scored 12 so it’s not exactly been value for money for season ticket holders.
For our purposes though, incredibly just one of their 16 home league games have seen over 2.5 goals this term and although Barca have been scoring plenty on the road recently – I’m backing the Sociedad defence to do it’s job.
Elsewhere, after Barca’s last two displays left a lot to be desired so there’s no confidence in the match result, as they could just as easily slip to another narrow loss as pinch the points themselves.
If the visitors are to score it’s likely to come via an assist from Ousmane Dembele, as he’s provided nine assists in his last eight league games and is 7/2 to add another.
The half-time result is something we can get stuck into given the stats – especially with Sociedad having 20 games being level at the break, 13 of those coming at home.
Amazingly Sociedad home fans have witnessed a goalles first half in 12 of their 16 home games this term.
Barcelona have 14 half-time draws with nine away from home. It’s tempting to go all-in and back a goalless first half but we’ll play safe and back the HT draw at 11/10.
Finally, we’ll take advantage of Sociedad being the fair play champions this season and back Barcelona to see more cards at a healthy 11/10.
Sociedad have been booked 33 times at home this season while Barca have been brandished with 50 yellows and four reds away from home.
At one of the toughest away trips they can face in terms of trying to break down a defence then they’re a solid bet to win the card count.
Source: Betfair Spanish La Liga
