Mourinho’s first Man Utd trophy won’t be Community Shield
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Looking purely from a betting standpoint, Manchester United are considered comfortable favourites to give Jose Mourinho an early trophy following his appointment as manager this summer.
It is 10/11 that Man Utd beat Leicester inside the 90 minutes in the Community Shield and 4/9 that they simply lift the trophy.
However, Emile Heskey is one man tipping his former club to pull off a surprise upset and recent history also tips the scales in favour of the Foxes.
Since returning to Wembley for the 2013 showpiece between Man Utd and Wigan, all three Community Shields have followed similar trajectories.
All have been won without the victorious team conceding a goal and also by the team considered to be the home side on the day.
David Moyes’ Red Devils defeated Wigan 2-0, Arsenal dominated Manchester City 3-0 and then 12 months ago, the Gunners prevailed 1-0 over Chelsea.
Based on the repetitiveness of this trend, Leicester not only look attractive at 7/2 in the match betting market, but also at the more profitable 6/1 to win to nil.
Another recurring element of the last three years is that the winning team have opened the scoring inside the first 30 minutes.
Robin van Persie netted after six in 2013, Santi Cazorla broke the deadlock after 22 the following year and Alex Oxlade-Chamberlain bagged the only goal on 24 minutes last term.
Claudio Ranieri’s charges are 5/2 to score first, 7/2 to be leading at the interval and a massive 16/1 to be ahead at both half-time and full-time, as the last three winners have.
In the last decade, Van Persie is the only striker to score the opening goal in the Community Shield, which suggests there is better value deeper into the first scorer market.
Riyad Mahrez is the obvious Leicester player to jump out at 9/1, although it has often paid to look towards less-frequent scorers. Ricardo Carvalho, Antonio Valencia and Chris Smalling are among those to have struck first in the past decade.
Danny Drinkwater is 20/1 grab the opener against his former club and despite only scoring three times in the Premier League last season, he had more attempts than striker teammate Leonardo Ulloa.
All Odds and Markets are correct as of the date of publishing
