Recent Play Details

4% Villarreal -1 (1:30 ET): With Real Sociedad winning on Tuesday, the importance of getting all three points here is huge for Villarreal, who are chasing Sociedad for the fourth and final Champions League spot in La Liga. The way things stand as of press time, Villarreal is now eight points back, which means they’ll not only need to win out, but also hope Sociedad picks up nothing more than a solitary point from its final two matches. There’s also the matter of goal differential, but if they were to win out, then Villarreal would be ahead in that regard. Plus, the main tiebreak is head to head points and Villarreal wins there as well. 

La Liga’s “other” Yellow Submarine, Cadiz, are at the opposite end of the table and still in the relegation battle. Right now, Cadiz (38 points) are only three clear of the drop zone. They won a critical six-pointer last week against Valladolid (2-0) but other results did not go Cadiz’ way as Almeria (39 pts), Valencia (39 pts) Espanyol (34 pts) all won while Getafe (35 pts) earned a draw. (Then Valladolid won Tuesday). Worrisome from the Cadiz perspective is that they have the league’s third worst GD (-22) and are the second lowest scoring team in Spain (28 goals in 35 matches), topping only relegation-bound Elche. Also, they typically are very bad on their travels (just six points out of a possible 27 since January). Cadiz also have a bottom three xGD in the league.

Thanks to a stoppage time goal (90’+4) from Gerard Moreno last week against Girona, Villarreal were able to pick up their 9th win in the last 13 La Liga matches. They have lost only two of those 13 and are unbeaten across the L5 (4 wins and a draw). Even more encouraging is that Villarreal have scored in 14 consecutive league matches with 2+ goals on nine separate occasions. They’ve won three straight here at home, scoring 12 goals along the way.  I look for the home team to win by multiple goals on Wednesday. 4% Villarreal -1 (Play to -150)