Nottingham Forest vs Burnley Bet Builder Tips and Stats

I’m keen to back Nottingham Forest’s Morgan Gibbs-White to register either a goal or an assist on Sunday afternoon against Burnley. Gibbs-White’s goal involvement figures this season have perhaps flown under the radar somewhat. After scoring the only goal of the game against Porto on Thursday night, the Forest ace has now registered 12 goals and 5 assists across 47 appearances in all competitions this season. It is also worth noting that 3 of those strikes have come in his last 5 Premier League outings, with the attacking midfielder notably finding the net away at both Manchester City and Tottenham.

With that in mind, Gibbs-White looks well placed to add to those numbers by making his mark against a Burnley side who hold the worst defensive record in the division. The fact that the out-of-sorts Clarets have conceded 2 or more goals in 22 of their 32 Premier League matches this season, including in 13 of their 16 away fixtures, only strengthens the case for backing Gibbs-White to deliver another goal contribution on Sunday afternoon.

I’m also going to focus on Morgan Gibbs-White in the fouls market by backing him to win a minimum of two free kicks on Sunday. The all-action Nottingham Forest midfielder tends to find himself right in the thick of the action, and there’s been a notable rise in the number of fouls he’s been drawing in recent months. In fact, Gibbs-White has been brought down at least once in each of his last 13 Premier League outings, and has drawn multiple fouls in 7 of those contests.

With Gibbs-White likely to be closely marked by Burnley’s Florentino, I think there’s a strong case for the Forest star to be fouled on 2 or more occasions again during Sunday’s clash at the City Ground. The tough-tackling Burnley midfielder is committing an average of 1.76 fouls per game in the Premier League this season, and has been penalised 2+ times in 5 of the last 8 matches in which he has started, including last week’s 2-0 defeat to Brighton.

While I fancy Nottingham Forest to get the job done on Sunday, I do think Burnley can get themselves on the scoresheet as well. Despite a difficult season, Scott Parker’s side have shown a tendency to make the net bulge away from home in the Premier League, underlined by the fact they have scored in 12 of their 16 road trips to date. That is further reflected in the fact that both teams have scored in 12 of Burnley’s 16 Premier League away games this season, including 3 of their last 4.

With that in mind, the relegation-threatened visitors could breach the hosts backline on Sunday, particularly with Forest likely to be feeling the effects of their exertions from the Europa League on Thursday night. It’s also worth pointing out that both teams have scored in 3 of Nottingham Forest’s last 5 top-flight fixtures, which adds further weight to siding with a repeat at the City Ground this weekend.