North Macedonia host Scotland at 19:45 UK on Saturday 3 October at the Toše Proeski Arena in Skopje, with neither side having scored a goal in this Nations League window.
Go back further and it gets starker. North Macedonia have not scored in five matches. Scotland have scored once in five. Between them that is one goal in ten games.
Scotland lost 0-3 at home to Switzerland on Tuesday and drew 0-0 in Slovenia before that. Their World Cup summer was 0-3 against Brazil, 0-1 against Morocco and a 1-0 win in Haiti, which is the single goal. They do at least defend: a clean sheet in one of two in this window, and ninth of 54 for clean sheet rate. They are also seventh of 54 for fouls at 16 a game.
North Macedonia have had the worse of it. They lost 2-0 in Slovenia and 0-3 at home to Switzerland, and before that drew 0-0 twice and lost 4-0 in Turkey. They rank fiftieth of 54 for goals conceded at 2.5 a game and fifty-first for shots on target at half a shot on target a game. Team sheets are not confirmed.
The model projects 1.50 goals for Scotland and 0.85 for North Macedonia, a combined 2.35, the lowest total of Saturday's Nations League card.
Scotland to win is rated 52.5 per cent against a margin-free implied 53.6, so the favourite is priced accurately. North Macedonia at 5.00 carry 21.3 per cent against an implied 18.8, a gap of two and a half points and the only selection here the model has above the market by any distance.
On the totals, under 2.5 goals is projected at 58.4 against an implied 57.1 and both teams to score, No, at 55.6 against 53.6. Both lean the quiet way by a point or two, which is what you would expect of two sides who have managed one goal between them in ten matches and sit in the competition where goals get shared out less evenly than in club football.
See the live Statz numbers for this fixture.
The referee is François Letexier, averaging two yellow cards and 19.75 fouls a game across four matches this season. That is a notably permissive whistle, and it meets a Scotland side ranked seventh of 54 for fouls and a North Macedonia side seventh for cards at three a game. The two pull against each other.
The one firm player line is in midfield. Lewis Ferguson has made two or more tackles in all five of his last five, twelve in total at 2.4 a game, priced at 1.70. In a match projected for very little shooting, the tackle and foul counts are where the volume is.
Neither side offers much at the other end. Scotland are projected for 4.6 shots on target, North Macedonia 3.3.
See the live Statz numbers for this fixture.
Scotland should be good enough and the price says so without generosity. The number that matters is the total, and two attacks this blunt facing each other is the clearest argument on the page for the quieter side of every goals market.
The read is a low-scoring Scotland win, with the fouls and tackles carrying more of the match than the shots, and a referee whose own numbers argue against the cards markets rather than for them.
18+. Please gamble responsibly - begambleaware.org. Odds correct at time of writing and subject to change. Statz publishes model projections, not advice.