Super Bowl LVIII tips and predictions: Match winner, spread pick, total bet and MVP winner

We're throwing our eggs in one basket on Sunday as we go all in our selections for Super Bowl LVIII as the Kansas City Chiefs face the San Francisco 49ers.

Super Bowl LVIII suggested bets

Kansas City Chiefs to win

Kansas City Chiefs +2.5

MVP: Patrick Mahomes

Under 48.5 points

Planet Sport Bet Superbowl offer: Bet £20, get £5 free bet if over 50 points are scored (includes overtime) 

 

Kansas City Chiefs vs San Francisco 49ers

The defending Super Bowl Champion Kansas City Chiefs will square off against the San Francisco 49ers at Allegiant Stadium in Las Vegas, Nevada on Sunday.

A crowd above 70,000 will be in attendance to watch Super Bowl LVIII, Usher’s halftime show and an excessive amount of camera pans to Taylor Swift and Roger Goodell.

The Chiefs beat off stiff competition from the Baltimore Ravens, the Buffalo Bills and Miami Dolphins, allowing just 10 second-half points.

The 49ers have played one less game as the number-one seed but so nearly made a hash of it, overturning a 24-7 half-time deficit against the Detroit Lions.

Before that, they trailed 21-14 to the Green Bay Packers in the fourth quarter but bounced back for their first come-from-behind win of the season.

Sometimes, two and two equals four. The 49ers cannot afford to continue their slack defensive play, because the Chiefs can put teams away and keep them there.

 

 

While Kansas does struggle against the run, both teams are top-five passing defences so any deficit could prove fatal.

That said, we’re not particularly concerned for the Chiefs in that department because, firstly, no one stops Christian McCaffrey anyway. And second, they don’t allow many rushing touchdowns.

For all the yards they do allow, they’ve stepped up in the red zone. Only three teams have allowed fewer rushing touchdowns this season.

It’ll take a real effort to slow Brock Purdy down but we think the books are overestimating him here, as his total of 245.5 passing yards is higher than other elite quarterbacks tend to achieve in the playoffs when top-five defences meet.

Conditions inside the dome will indeed be perfect for passers, and that probably explains why Mahomes boasts a stellar 13-1 record indoors.

When it comes down to it, it’s hard to ignore that the 49ers' wins have been emphatic, and their losses have been small-margin defeats because of key moments where they failed to execute.

That’s what Kansas is so good at doing and we expect their Super Bowl experiences to lead them to a win and cover.

 

Points total

Public opinion is a high-scoring game because we have two elite quarterbacks, two elite teams and all sorts of scoring threats in the air and on the ground.

However, the 49ers will be best served by tightening up on defence and eliminating some of the mistakes we’ve seen.

Both teams will be extremely cautious early in the game to avoid errors, and we’ve seen how good the Chiefs have been in the second half.

The under has cashed in four of five Super Bowls including the Chiefs' 31-20 win over the 49ers in 2020.

 

 

Super Bowl LVIII MVP

Whichever team wins the Super Bowl, it’s usually the case that the MVP award goes to the starting quarterback.

There have been exceptions, and there is one scenario where the award goes elsewhere in this game.

Travis Kelce would seem the only viable Chiefs option that isn’t the QB, but the odds tell you how unlikely that is.

The Chiefs shut down Purdy but McCaffrey runs them over and rushes for a couple of touchdowns, then you have yourself a Super Bowl MVP at 4/1.

However, we’re backing the Chiefs, so we have to back Mahomes. He’s thrown for over 4,000 yards this season for 27 touchdowns and he’s been here and got the t-shirt multiple times.

Planet Sport Bet Superbowl offer: Bet £20, get £5 free bet if over 50 points are scored (includes overtime)