Round 16 in the 2021 AFL season gets underway on Thursday night as the Gold Coast Suns ‘host’ the Richmond Tigers from Marvel Stadium at 7.20pm. As always, PuntingInDanger has you covered with a full preview and betting tips for the clash and remember to head to our Round 16 AFL Tips page for our predictions on all nine games over the weekend.
AFL Gold Coast vs Richmond Betting Tips
Marvel Stadium, Thursday 7.20pm (AEST)
If you looked up this Thursday night schedule in the pre-season you’d probably be pretty disappointed, but the recent struggles from the Tigers have added some intrigue to this clash, which kicks off Round 16 in the AFL.
Match Prediction
A recent COVID-19 outbreak in Queensland has forced the entire AFL into hubs in Victoria. Who would have thought that would be the case last year when we were struggling to find suitable venues for the 10 Victorian AFL teams to live and play football.
The game that was supposed to be played at Metricon will now be at Marvel Stadium and while Gold Coast members will get priority for tickets, there’s no doubt that the Richmond fans will far outweigh the Suns supporters on Thursday night.
The Tigers are in a tough stretch of form at the moment, looking absolutely deplorable in a Friday night footy loss to the Saints in Round 15. The Tigers kicked just two goals in the match, their lowest score in over 50 years as the Saints cruised to a 40 point victory. The Tigers have now lost their last two in a row and three of their last five games and if it weren’t for a shock loss to Hawthorn by GWS on the weekend, the Tigers would find themselves out of the top eight.
The Tigers are still battling some injury problems, with the likes of Noah Balta, Nathan Broad, Dion Prestia and Ivan Soldo all set to be out for this game. David Astbury, Mabior Chol and Nick Vlaustin all face fitness tests to be available this weekend. (TOM LYNCH HAS BEEN SELECTED)
Luckily for the Tigers, they get a really good opportunity to bounce back this week against a Suns team that has looked just woeful of late. Gold Coast have lost their last three games on the trot and six of their last seven after going down to the bottom team in the competition in North Melbourne on the weekend.
The Suns had some success early in their franchise history against the Tigers, winning three of their first four games. Since then, however, the matchup has been a bloodbath, with the Tigers winning the last six games by an average margin of 53.3 points per game.
I expect the Tigers to bounce back and win this one but the 32.5 point line is a touch high for my liking given how they have looked recently. I do like the look of the over though. Not counting last year’s game in shortened quarters, the Tigers have scored a monster 125 points per game against the Suns, with those games resulting in an average of 190.2 total points. There’s no doubt the Tigers aren’t in the greatest scoring form at the moment but this is a really good matchup for them and they generally score pretty well at Marvel.
(Roof open/closed also shouldn’t be an issue on Thursday night as the weather in Melbourne looks to be clear at this stage.)
Over 164.5 Points (1.5 Units)
$1.90
Same Game Multi
Really like the Tigers to win here as the anchor leg for our multi. There’s not a lot of meat left on the bone for the Tigers but I just can’t see the Suns challenging at the moment, especially with this game being played at Marvel.
Jack Riewoldt will need to play a lone hand once gain in the Tigers forward line with Tom Lynch out of action. He has a great record against the Suns, never going goaless in eight games, kicking 23 goals in that span including the monster game of 10 in 2018.
Jayden Short 20+ disposals has been one of our favourite same game multi legs throughout the season so far and we’ll continue to hammer it home as long as he keeps racking them up. He has cleared 20 in all 14 games he has played this season, so $1.22 is still good value for this leg.
(TOM LYNCH WAS A SHOCK INCLUSION INTO THE TIGERS LINE-UP. Riewoldt has a fantastic record against the Suns, so we still like this bet)
Tigers H2H
Riewoldt 3+ Goals
Short 20+ Disp.
GC vs RICH Same Game Multi
$3.40
