Phillip Cocu’s Derby County welcome Neil Warnock’s Cardiff City to Pride Park Stadium on Friday night for the first of the Championship’s matchday seven fixtures. The Rams haven’t started off well, having only won one of their six matches so far. The Bluebirds aren’t much better with just two wins so far this season.

Derby vs Cardiff Betting Tips and Predictions: Derby

Cocu’s team will have expected to have gotten off to a better start thanks to last season’s run that saw them narrowly miss out on Premier League promotion when they lost to Aston Villa in the Playoff final. Having lost their manager Frank Lampard to Chelsea, Cocu has the difficult task of meeting high expectations at Pride Park.

So far this season things haven’t gone to plan, however, while they’ve only won one Championship match so far, beating Huddersfield Town on the opening day of the season, they’ve only lost two matches in the Championship, they’ve drawn the other three fixtures.

In some good news, striker Martyn Waghorn has started off the season in great form, scoring three goals in six appearances for the Rams. Two youngsters have settled into the team quite well too, Kieran Dowell was brought in from Sheffield United and has looked like a good purchase, while Jason Knight has risen up though Derby’s youth teams to claim a place in the starting lineup.

Derby vs Cardiff Betting Tips and Predictions: Cardiff

Cardiff seem to be suffering from a post Premier League hangover and don’t exactly look like they’ll be making a fast return to England’s top tier of football. However, looks can of course be deceiving and there’s no better manager in the Championship than Neil Warnock to grind out a promotional season.

They need to start winning more matches though, that is quite obvious too. So far they’ve beaten both Luton and Huddersfiel at home, lost to both Reading and Wigan and drew with Blackburn away and Fulham at home in the last round of matches.

Throughout the years Warnocks’ teams have nearly always struggled for goals, last season Cardiff’s top scorers, Bobby Reid and Victor Camarasa only managed to score five goals each. Both players left Cardiff in the transfer window. It’s the same old story this year, Cardiff can hardly score, they’ve only scored seven goals so far this season, no player has scored more than one goal.

Derby vs Cardiff Betting Tips and Predictions: Stats

Of Derby’s matches so far this season they’ve won one, drawn three and lost two. Over 2.5 goals has occurred in 4/6 matches, while BTTS has landed in 4/6.

Of Cardiff’s matches so far this season, they’ve won two, drawn two and lost two. Over 2.5 goals has occurred in 4/6 matches, while BTTS has landed in 4/6 as well.

In recent head to head matches things have been pretty even with both teams winning two matches each and drawing one. Over 2.5 goals has occurred in 3/5 matches, while BTTS has landed in 3/5 as well.

Derby vs Cardiff Betting Tips and Predictions: Predictions and Tips

The Asian Handicap line opened at 0.25 and has moved to 0 meaning that the market doesn’t give Derby the advantage that the bookies were willing to, or in other words the market thinks Derby are worse than the bookies think. The goal line has opened at 2.75 though and hasn’t moved, meaning they’re expecting plenty of goals in the match.

There’s some value to be had in the Over 2.5 goals market though, the line opened at 1.74 and is now at 1.86 so there’s some value there.

BTTS is a horrible price at 1.65 and while you’d expect both teams to get on the scoresheet that price is just too low to recommend. Nobody likes betting on draws but if ever a match looked like a stalemate this is certainly one of those. The draw is currently around 3.50.