The Longshot: Haaland has his eyes on the same goal

IT DIDN’T come as much of a surprise that Norwegian ace Erling Haaland, who scored 52 goals (36 in the league, including four hat-tricks) in all competitions in his debut season with Pep Guardiola’s Man City, was voted as player of the season by his peers this week.

Haaland has started the season leading City’s attack once again as they look to secure a sixth Premier League title in seven years.

He only scored one in his last four league outings during City’s run-in, and could have hit the 40-goal mark if City needed to really push for the title. He scored 36 league goals last term.

Haaland scored two in the opening fixture against Burnley and added another against Sheffield United last weekend to leave him on three goals from three games so far (he scored one goal more than the games he played in the league last year).

He is 2/5 to be the top scorer again in the Premier League, with Mo Salah second favourite at 12/1, but few would back the Egyptian to convert as many chances as Haaland over the season, especially considering he may not stay at Anfield for the whole season if he gets his head turned by the Saudis.

His teammate Darwin Nunez moved from 33/1 into 20/1 after his late brace against Newcastle on Sunday, but you might as well back a loose horse in the Grand National.

Haaland is 7/4 to score more than the entire Luton Town team (who have one from the penalty spot so far), with odds of 11/4 to outscore Sheffield United and only 7/2 to outscore ex-City man Vincent Kompany’s Burnley side.

Luton play their first home game in the top flight in three decades this evening against West Ham.

Kenilworth Road has presumably undergone the necessary upgrades to become a Premier League ground, although pictures from its press box showed garden furniture seats (not set out on plastic grass at least) and plywood tables that suggest there is a bit of work to do yet.

West Ham have surprised many by picking up seven points from their opening three matches to leave them second in the table, including 3-1 wins against Brighton and Chelsea, both of whom defeated  Luton by three goals.

The Hammers have barely had more than 30% possession in both those games however.

David Moyes’ side are 12/1 to win 3-1 again this evening.

James Ward-Prowse, Konstantinos Mavropanos and Mohammed Kudus have been signed using the money made from Declan Rice, astute additions that suggest Director of football Mark Noble may be more than an “old boys’ club” appointment.

It will be the first time the Hatters have met the Hammers since an FA Cup quarter-final replay in 1994, in which a Scott Oakes hat-trick gave the Hatters a memorable 3-2 win.

Luton are 10/3 to land their first Premier League victory of the season and it is 12/1 that they win 1-0.

West Ham are 8/11 while the draw is currently priced up at 11/4. Luton have not lost 20 of the last 22 home matches and with a big atmosphere guaranteed in the small stadium, 16/1 on a 2-1 win isn’t the worst call you could make and is our recommendation for this weekend.

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LIAM SMITH stopped Chris Eubank Jr when they first met back in January at the AO Arena in Manchester.

The fight looked like being a close one, but Smith won by a TKO in the fourth round.

Eubank insisted he could go on but the ref was right to call time on him as he was glassy of eye and wobbly of foot and would not have lasted much longer.

Too cocky for his own good, Eubank chose to look flashy and dodge shots with his hands down instead of tucking up or holding, trying to replicate his trainer Roy Jones Jr in his pomp.

It didn’t work and he now has Brian ‘Bo Mac’ McIntyre in his corner, who is heralded for outstanding work with undisputed superstar Terence Crawford.

Smith and Eubank now have three defeats each and meet again tomorrow evening in the same venue.

Smith is the more level-headed fighter but Eubank has more to lose as his career is literally on the line.

With a resurgence of Smith’s career, he is fully motivated to repeat what he did seven months ago and move on to a middleweight title fight. Eubank’s lack of punch resistance should be a major concern, leading to a more cautious approach in the rematch and openings for Smith to fight on the front foot.

The beaten man believes Smith used an elbow in their first fight, but says he’s putting the past behind him.

“It’s part of the game,” Eubank said about losing, during the weigh-in face-off.

“It’s part of growing as a fighter. Nobody’s perfect, and now we get to do it again to make sure that we really know who the better fighter is. There’s still a lot of questions that need to be answered. What happens when these two men get into a dogfight and they’re trading? No flash knockdowns. No jabbing competition. What happens when it gets saucy?” Eubank was favourite last time but Smith is now at 4/6 and Eubank Jr. is the slight underdog at 11/8. Odds for a draw are 16/1.

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NEWCASTLE came into the season with outside title hopes, but defeats to Man City and Liverpool mean Eddie Howe probably cannot afford another loss away to Brighton in tomorrow’s late kick-off. It was one-dimensional management from Howe in Newcastle’s bizarre defeat to Liverpool last weekend. Howe failed to put 10-man Liverpool to the sword. He decided to sit and grind on a 1-0 lead and took off his main scoring threat. It was too safe and lacking in imagination.

Both teams are 6/4 but with Sven Botman — a key central defender for Newcastle — looks set to be missing with an ankle injury and with Brighton aiming to rebound after a poor loss to West Ham (when Evan Ferguson looked sharp, but he just couldn’t net), I’d favour the south coast side to subdue the Toon.

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CAVAN’S Leona Maguire is hoping to become the first Irish woman to win her home event at Dromoland Castle this weekend.

She was the pre-tournament favourite but was six shots behind having played eight holes yesterday morning.

It is worth bearing in mind that she performed a late charge at the same venue after some early woes last year and if she is a price in the double figures today or tomorrow she should still give the competition a rattle.

We followed her around for a round there last year and she doesn’t know when she is beat.

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EILEEN Gleeson has taken over as the Irish women’s caretaker manager after the FAI and Ver Pauw parted company this week.

They host Northern Ireland on Saturday, September 23 in the Nations League before a match against Hungary in Budapest three days later and Pauw’s former assistant is 5/4 to get the role permanently.

Tom Elmes replaced Gleeson as Pauw’s assistant when she left to take up a coaching role in Glasgow and he is 2/1 to step up to the main job. Gleeson did win 26 of the 30 league games that she had in charge of Glasgow however, and she is now back within the FAI as the Head of Women and Girls Football.

Former England boss and late of Inter Miami, Phil Neville is quoted as a 4/1 shot to take the role.

Former Irish boss Colin Bell, who did so well with South Korea at the recent World Cup is 5/1 to return.

The Bet

TOMORROW marks one year since we resumed control of betting responsibilities in these sports pages. Back during our first stint we used to compile a six-month appraisal of how we’d done, but because no one took much notice or gave us much credit for the 10 per cent return we delivered I’ve decided it isn’t worth all the effort on this circuit. We can say with some confidence that if you had followed this advice for the past 12 months you would now be up, albeit that is mostly down to my able replacement tipping an 83/1 shot last week. Take 16/1 on Luto to win 2-1.