Best Bet: 

Birmingham City Moneyline -130 (TheScore Bet / Fanatics)

There are no Premier League matches this weekend as English clubs play in the 3rd round of the FA Cup.

If you’re unfamiliar with how Cups work in world soccer, it is kind of like a bracket-style, knockout tournament available to all teams within the top 9 divisions of English soccer, with byes for the better teams through the first few rounds.

Think March Madness, if March Madness was open to all collegiate programs with the better teams coming in closer to the end.

For this bet, I’m backing Birmingham City to win in regulation time on the road against Cambridge United.

Admittedly, these are not clubs I follow week-in and week-out. However, there are a few reasons I like this bet.

First and foremost, Birmingham City are currently playing in the Championship, the 2nd division in the English soccer pyramid. Cambridge United are playing in League Two, the 4th division of English soccer.

However, both clubs were on the opposite side of League One (3rd division) last season, with Birmingham winning the league and securing automatic promotion and Cambridge finishing 2nd to last.

Birmingham won both the home and away fixture against Cambridge last season when playing in League One.

So why aren’t Birmingham bigger favorites? 

For starters, these Cup competitions can be tricky to win in regulation. Further, Cambridge are playing at home, where they haven’t lost since September 6. They’re currently unbeaten in 14 matches in all competitions.

Meanwhile, Birmingham have struggled on the road, failing to win any of their last 7 road trips. They’ll also be without Demarai Gray, their 2nd leading scorer this season.

However, this is a perfect opportunity for Birmingham City to flip their away form. They are a club with a roughly $30M-$50M squad who have played in the 2nd tier for 14 of the last 15 seasons, up against a squad with less than $5M market value and who has played 4th-tier soccer for 8 of the last 12 seasons.

Bottom Line: Despite the good home form of Cambridge and poor home form of Birmingham, this is still a 2nd-tier team playing a 4th-tier team. Birmingham has the depth, squad value, and weight of expectation to get the win in regulation.