Tips For Monday 3rd January

Back to the fray, with games from the Championship and Spain. I won six of my eight Championship recommendations for a three point profit in December, so as they're the early kickoffs on Monday we'll start here.

nPower Championship
Both 3:00pm GMT
Barnsley v Coventry
Under 2.5 goals

Reading v Burnley
Definitely worth a look at the draw or opposing Burnley in this one - the only team that's drawn more games at home than Reading have this season is Nottingham Forest and Burnley have drawn the most games away from home. It also helps that the Clarets haven't won in Berkshire for almost 30 years and five of the last ten league games between these at Reading have finished in draws.

My December predictions for La Liga managed a 50% strike rate, so I'm looking to improve that this month. The main issue was picking home winners amongst the 'second tier' of Spanish clubs so I'm going to be more cautious about those this month. It looks as if Espanyol, Villareal and Osasuna might be worth backing at home in January, so when they're at home I'll add them to the calendar. The goal markets were a bit more consistent (two wins from three recommendations in December) so depending on what comes up there might be some more of those in January.

At time of posting, all three of the recommendations below were drifting, so it's worth keeping an eye on the prices and recycling any wins from the Championship bets if necessary.

La Liga
7:00pm GMT
VILLAREAL v Almeria
Definitely worth a look - I backed Villareal to beat Sevilla last month and they've got a good record against teams of a similar level to Almeria

Atletico Madrid v Racing Santander
Racing Santander have only won twice in their last sixteen league visits to the Vicente Calderon and only Osasuna have a worse away record this season.

Real Zaragoza v Real Sociedad
Over 2.5 goals - six of the last ten league meetings between these two at La Romareda have been over, including four of the last five. Seven of Real Sociedad's eight away games this season have also been over.

Busy week this week - Premiership and Greek tips coming tomorrow.