Premier League best bets: Tottenham vs. Man City predictions, picks for Tuesday 5/14

Tottenham vs. Man City Odds

Tuesday, May 14, 3 p.m. ET, Peacock

Odds via bet365. Get up-to-the-minute Soccer odds here.

Tottenham

Tottenham have been pretty thoroughly dominated in both meetings with Manchester City this season, but it’s really only because of two areas, high turnovers and set pieces.

Spurs are a team that is going to build out of the back, regardless of who the opponent is. In the first meeting at the Etihad, they were severely hampered by injuries and had to start a center back pairing of Emerson Royal and Ben Davies, which led to numerous easy chances from City off their 11 forced high turnovers. But, when Tottenham had their most success was breaking quickly in transition or making one touch passes to runners in behind Manchester City’s back line once they beat the first line of pressure. Two of their three goals in the first meeting came off of these two scenarios in this first meeting.

One guy who didn’t play in either match was James Maddison, who has been crucially important to Tottenham’s build up given his ability to drop deep and drag defenders with him. You’ll see him a lot of times out wide when opponents try to play man to man, which creates space centrally for all of Tottenham’s other attackers. But he is their main man in terms of getting the ball going forward. He has 205 progressive passes this season in only 21.8 90s. Next closest on the team in Pedro Porro with 180 and he’s played 10 more matches.

Man City

Manchester City had one of their best performances out of possession against Fulham on Sunday, holding them to just one shot for the entirety of the match. Things will be a little different against Tottenham and even though they've had success high pressing in both meetings, for the season, City are not an elite pressing team.

Manchester City are ninth in both PPDA and final third to box entry conversion rate allowed, as well as 11th in build up completion percentage allowed. Their lack of elite pressing has come back to bite them in a lot matches, as well as their defending in transition. The reason they have conceded a lot of chances in transition is because Pep Guardiola has identified that they need to push Rodri and Gvardiol high up the pitch to help overload the last line of defense and has accepted that there will often times be 3 v 3 situations in transition.

Even though City have been running up the score against lesser competition, they still have not beaten a bgi six club in the Premier League outside of Manchester United. Additionally, Manchester City’s performances against the top sides away from the Etihad haven’t been great all season long. In their last two against Chelsea and Real Madrid they failed to create over one expected goal, and they were thoroughly outplayed by Liverpool at Anfield, giving up 2.7 expected goals. They’ve lost and failed to create over one expected goal against Aston Villa and Arsenal away from home.

Tottenham vs Man City

Prediction

There is the overarching thing in the air where if Tottenham were to get a result, it would give the title to their North London rivals, which is a very difficult thing to bet into, but with their chances for top four still mathematically alive, I think we’ll get some good effort here from Tottenham because the chance to play in the Champions League will override any hatred for their rival, no matter what the fans say.

There is a ton of "must win" baked into this line. When these two met in the FA Cup in December, Manchester City closed as a -120 favorite at Tottenham. Now, given the situation, they are more than double that price, which I don't believe is warranted, especially with Tottenham having James Maddison available.

If you are a believer in bogey teams, which are teams that certain teams struggled with for no particular reason, Tottenham are that to Manchester City. Since 2020, Manchester City are 4-1-5 against Tottenham.

I only have Manchester City projected at -143, so I like the value on Tottenham +1.5 at -108.

Pick: Tottenham +1.5 (-108 via bet365)