Back Dundee to exit Scottish Premier League

Rangers may not be in Scotland`s top flight for the first time ever but the absence of the Ibrox Stadium club makes for the best ante-post Scottish Premier League bet.

The decision to remove Rangers from a competition that it has won a record 54 times took most of the close season, meaning that the team that took their place among the 12-club elite have had little time to prepare.

The Scottish Premier League invited last season`s Scottish First Division runner-up, Dundee, to replace Rangers on Monday 16 July 2012, leaving the Dark Blues fewer than three full weeks to get ready for a top-flight campaign.

Unsurprisingly, bookmakers have installed Dundee as the Scottish Premier League wooden spoon favourite. What is surprising, however, are the relegation odds at which the Dark Blues are trading. They are around 9-4 to finish bottom of the table. In all honesty, they should be odds-on shots.

Surely Dundee has very little chance of ending the Scottish Premier League season above Ross County, the 10-3 second favourite for the dreaded drop. The Dark Blues were 25 points behind the Staggies by the time that last term`s Scottish First Division wrapped up and the quality gap between the respective sides has grown appreciably.

For whereas Dundee manager Barry Smith has not invested heavily in improving his team`s squad because he did not expect to be facing the likes of Celtic, Hearts and local rival Dundee United this season, Ross County boss Derek Adams has splashed his club`s cash to make several solid signings across all areas of the pitch, although the Staggies have lost Michael Gardyne to the Tangerines.

It would be misleading to say that the Scottish Premier League relegation race is between just Dundee and Ross County. After all, Inverness Caledonian Thistle only guaranteed its seat at Scottish football`s top table by winning its final two matches last season. Before that, Terry Butcher`s side had won only once in 14 games, a sequence that must worry the former England defender.

Butcher, though, has bolstered Caley`s roster during the close season. While ICT will be towards the bottom of the Scottish Premier League ladder, its relegation odds of 6-1 are nowhere near as appealing as those of Dundee.

Quite simply, Dundee is must-bet material at 9-4 and even the widely available 2-1. Seriously, the Dark Blues are more likely to go down than stay up, which means that punters who back them at around 9-4 are getting incredible value. Those odds equate to a relegation chance of about 31 per cent. One could argue that Smith`s team is a 60% relegation chance.

Dundee travels to Kilmarnock in the Scottish Premier League first round, which kicks off on Saturday 4 August 2012 with 1-25 title favourite Celtic entertaining Aberdeen.

The likelihood is that Dundee will lose its opening game and Ross County, which hosts Motherwell at the Global Energy Stadium, will not slump to defeat so, if you are going to back the Dark Blues to be relegated, do so right away.

For your information, Rangers does not start its Scottish Third Division campaign this weekend. The Glasgow giants are playing East Fife in a Scottish Communities League Cup tie on Monday 6 August 2012. They are around 1-6 favourites.

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03/08/2012     © Frixo 2024