Plenty of boos but not many goals at St Mary's

21Jan 2013

England - Premier League

Southampton take on Everton in the Monday Night Football live on Sky Sports One at 20:00 and while over 2.5 goals is odds-on, Paul Robinson doesn't think Gary Neville will have too much action to analyse come full time.

The Saints are back in the top flight after two successive promotions and they've climbed to 15th in the league thanks to two defeats in 12. That wasn't deemed good enough by chairman, Nicola Cortese, though and he fired boss, Nigel Adkins, last week, instantly replacing him with Mauricio Pochettino. It's clearly a strange decision and one that has angered the fans of the South Coast club, including legendary ex player, Matt Le Tissier.

It's what happens on the pitch that interests us though and while we can't be sure how a change in manager will affect things, it's pretty safe to assume that Pochettino will play it safe for his first match in charge. A defeat will make the home crowd even more hostile so expect a cautious approach from a side that will largely remain unchanged in terms of personnel and tactics.

The goals have dried up for Southampton in recent months anyway, both for and against, especially at home. Since seeing four of their first five at St Mary's go over 2.5 goals, the last half dozen have all gone under, with the scorelines reading 1-1, 2-0, 1-1, 1-0, 0-1 and 1-1.

Everton are still hovering around the Champions League places and with Spurs only managing a draw yesterday, a win for the Merseysiders would see them move to just one point of the North Londoners.

After going through a spell of drawing too many games that they dominated, The Toffee's had seemingly put that behind them with three wins in four, but it was back to their old ways last time out against Swansea as the match finished 0-0.

David Moyes will take one positive from that though - a clean sheet - as it was their first since September, which ironically came against the Swans in Wales. I think that could instil some confidence in the back four and they should have enough to cope with an attack that hasn't netted more than once in six of their last seven at home.

This is an intriguing game for many reasons but from a betting perspective the value definitely lies in taking a low goal count position. Over 2.5 is pretty short at 1.9 and that's why I'm making it my lay of the day.