EPL Betting – Can Foxes Forge on sans Vardy?

Swansea City (+400) at Leicester City (-139), Draw (+245)

Leicester City’s lead at the top of the Premier League table took a hit last week. But they remain five clear with just four to play, and they have a great chance to pick up another three points hosting Swansea City at King Power Stadium this Sunday (11:15 AM Eastern).

Leicester were riding a five-game winning streak going before drawing West Ham (2-2) at home last week. By leaving two points on the board, Leicester saw their lead at the top of the standings trimmed from seven to five after Tottenham defeated Stoke City.

The draw with the Hammers was the first time in six games that Leicester conceded a goal. The team, which had been riding its potent offense for most of the season, has seemingly transformed into an Italian version of an EPL squad lately. Perhaps that shouldn’t come as a surprise, though, since their manager is Italian.

Claudio Ranieri will be looking for another clean sheet from his squad tomorrow facing the low-scoring Swans. Swansea has only managed 34 goals in as many games this season, and are mired in 14th place in the table.

They were blanked in their last outing, losing 3-0 to Newcastle, a team that’s likely to be relegated. That result was even more surprising given that the Swans have played some of their best soccer of late, including a 1-0 over Chelsea in early April.

While Ranieri won’t be all that concerned with Swansea’s attack, he will be fretting over his own team’s ability to score. The Foxes have only scored more than one goal once in their last six, and striker Jamie Vardy is suspended for tomorrow’s fixture.

“I don’t have another Vardy, but without him, I believe we can do something special,” said Ranieri in a mid-week press conference.

Leicester have won the last two games in the series, but scoring will be hard without Vardy. (Swansea actually has a respectable defense.) That puts the draw in play.

Pick: Draw (+245).

(Photo Credit: Kajsh (Own work) CC BY-SA 4.0 [http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0], via Wikimedia Commons.)