Punter Lands £11k Cards Acca… Despite Not Backing One of the Players That Won Their Bet

Referee Showing Yellow Card to Player During Match

Death, taxes and an Olivier Boscagli yellow card.

Only two Premier League players – Matty Cash and Matt Crooks – have been cautioned more times than the Brighton defender this term, so it’s only right that Boscagli formed part of an outstanding winning acca at the weekend.

The Frenchman was one of five players to feature on the cards acca of one canny Sky Bet customer, who wagered £10 that their quintet would all be shown yellows in their respective games.

And they were… sort of.

Four of the selections landed smoothly enough, but the fifth – Harry Maguire – was in serious jeopardy when the Manchester United centre back was substituted in their clash with Aston Villa.

But good news was just around the corner, as Ayden Heaven – Maguire’s replacement – would still find the time to pick up a caution of his own… completing our punter’s five-fold and landing a payout of over £11,000.

Here’s the tale of the tape as the card-happy punter celebrated five acts of low-level Premier League violence…

Not So Mellow Yellow

It was very much a Sunday funday as the cards were issued like confetti in the EPL.

And who better to kick off proceedings than that man Boscagli, who was written into referee Michael Oliver’s notebook in the 27th minute for a blatant foul on Brentford’s Dango Ouattara – halting a counter-attack with the most ‘professional’ of trips.

Oliver was in a sporty mood, sending off Igor Thiago and showing five other yellow cards as he seemingly lost order of the contest, which Brighton won 2-0.

Over on the east coast, Ipswich were hosting Bournemouth. A fairly tame encounter burst into life on the stroke of half time, as Adam Smith lost possession and hauled back the hosts’ Daizen Maeda, cutting off the threat of a dangerous counter.

That sparked footballing handbags, with Marcus Tavernier and Julio Enciso – our punter’s card pick – getting involved in a shoving match. After order had been restored, referee Simon Hooper reached into his pocket and showed yellows to Smith, Tavernier and Enciso.

Leaving It Late

There were four 2pm kick-offs on what was truly a super Sunday for Premier League fans, and out Sky Bet customer was engaged in the other two not already mentioned.

And this was where things began to get a little tricky, as neither of their selections had landed with just ten minutes and injury time left to play.

Thankfully, the football gods were smiling down as their two picks – Jefferson Lerma and Wesley Fofana – decided to pick up cautions for the daftest of reasons.

Finding themselves 0-2 down and barely having laid a glove on Liverpool, Crystal Palace would have been forgiven for fading quietly into another Premier League defeat. But not Lerma, who was incensed when Liverpool’s Victor Munoz dived outside the Eagles’ penalty area.

Lerma was not slow to let the Spaniard know what he thought of his simulation, and as Alexis Mac Allister stepped forward to defend his teammate, he and Lerma got involved in a tussle. The result? A yellow card for the Colombian.

Meanwhile, over at the Stadium of Light, a late foul by Sunderland’s Luke O’Nien sparked pandemonium between the Black Cats and opponents Chelsea in the hosts’ 1-0 victory.

In the resulting kerfuffle, O’Nien was booked alongside Sunderland boss Regis Le Bris and crucially, as far as our punter was concerned, Wesley Fofana – whose 92nd minute caution for dissent would have been music to the ears and eyes of those that had backed him to be carded.

Super Sub

With that quartet of 2pm kick offs in the bag, all that stood between the Sky Bet bettor and that £11,000 was a yellow card for Harry Maguire.

That seemed like a fair enough shout, with Maguire already booked four times this season and opponents Aston Villa finding a rich vein of form in attack.

But disaster struck early when the England defender suffered a recurrence of the back spasm that left him in agony during Manchester United’s win over Roma a few days prior.

Maguire’s replacement, Ayden Heaven, is rather less physical than the man he succeeded, but our punter needn’t have worried – the centre back clattered into Villa’s Alysson early in the second period to pick up that all-important yellow card.