The Carabao Cup second round gets written off as a lottery. On our projections it is not, or at least not for the reason people think.
The strongest selection on tonight's seventeen-tie card is Watford at home to Peterborough, projected at 63.4%. The strongest selection anywhere in the four English leagues next Saturday is Wolves at home to Stoke, at 60.2%. The cup card is, if anything, marginally less even than a normal league weekend, because the round pairs teams from different divisions.
So the fixtures are not the problem. The team sheets are. Everything below is about that gap.
Nobody knows who is rotating until the lineups drop. Some managers will field youngsters and a pure second string; others will want to protect league momentum and make one or two changes at most. Two clubs in identical league positions will treat this round completely differently, and neither will tell you in advance.
Our projections are honest about their own blind spot here. They are built on league form, and tonight's set was generated on Friday. They do not know who is being rested. When the model says Ipswich are 61.7% to beat Leicester, it means Ipswich's league-standard side against Leicester's league-standard side.
That is not a flaw to route around, it is the thing to plan for. It means every number on this page is a starting position, and the last hour before kick-off is where you finish the job.
This is the most useful thing on the page. A goals market does not care which eleven turns up, and if both managers change things the defending usually suffers before the attacking does.
The model's highest both-teams-to-score ties tonight:
| Tie | BTTS | 2+ goals |
|---|---|---|
| Southampton v West Ham | 62.4% | 81.8% |
| Cardiff v Norwich | 61.8% | 81.4% |
| Plymouth v Coventry | 58.9% | 81.3% |
| Watford v Peterborough | 57.5% | 83.5% |
| Ipswich v Leicester | 56.8% | 82.3% |
| Blackpool v Lincoln | 56.3% | 77.2% |
| Walsall v Leyton Orient | 55.7% | 76.0% |
| Birmingham v Brentford | 54.5% | 79.5% |
The ten highest-projected ties on the card all reach 76% or better for two or more goals. That is the shape of a round where nobody is quite settled.
The highest clean-sheet probability on the entire seventeen-tie card is 39.5%, for Wolves away at Sheffield Wednesday. After that it is Fleetwood at 38.9% and Middlesbrough at 38.5%.
Not one team on the card is even a 40% chance to keep it out. Backing a clean sheet, a correct score or a to-nil in this round is asking for precision the evening will not give you.
| Selection | Win % | Projected goals |
|---|---|---|
| Watford v Peterborough | 63.4% | 2.21 |
| Ipswich v Leicester | 61.7% | 2.12 |
| Middlesbrough at Doncaster | 61.1% | 2.00 |
| Brentford at Birmingham | 58.8% | 1.95 |
| Barnsley v Crewe | 55.9% | 1.80 |
| Wolves at Sheffield Wednesday | 54.9% | 1.70 |
| Coventry at Plymouth | 54.1% | 1.91 |
Note how quickly it flattens. By the seventh name you are at 54%, and below that the card is a coin toss - Fleetwood 45.6%, Lincoln 45.1%, Millwall 44.5%. There is no value in reaching down that list for a favourite; if the model will not commit past the halfway mark, neither should you.
Two trebles on today's Daily Acca, deliberately built as opposites.
The first takes the three strongest projected winners - Middlesbrough, Watford and Ipswich - and accepts the rotation risk in exchange for a price. The second takes the three highest both-teams-to-score ties and avoids the question entirely: it does not matter who is rested if both ends of the pitch are leaky.
Both are staked at a point, both are priced around 4.0, and both are published before team news, which is precisely why the routine above matters. Our record on every acca is public in the column's own ledger, winners and losers alike.
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