Everton - Newcastle United

The home price looks short for a team that has not scored in two matches. Everton were beaten two nil by Chelsea and two nil by Arsenal, and they go into this tie without Jack Grealish, Jarrad Branthwaite and Vitaliy Mykolenko. That is a lot of absence for a side already struggling to create anything, and it thins out the defence as well as the final third. Newcastle steadied themselves with a two nil win over Crystal Palace after back to back defeats. Valentino Livramento and Ewen Jaouen are unavailable, but neither of those absences reshapes the team the way Everton are being reshaped this week. A visiting squad that can rotate without losing much is in better shape than a home squad missing three of its better players. Recent history does favour the hosts. Newcastle have won only one of the last five meetings between these two, and that record is presumably part of why the market leans this way. What it also points to, though, is a lot of tight games, and that is exactly the outcome the quarter ball covers. Half the stake comes back if the ninety minutes finish level, and the full return lands if Newcastle are ahead at the whistle.