Bologna vs Cagliari

One club has taken almost everything from this fixture, without ever taking it comfortably. Bologna have won four of the last five league meetings, and every one of the five finished with a one or two-goal margin. Bologna won 2-1 at home on 2 September 2023; Cagliari took the return 2-1 in Sardinia on 14 January 2024; Bologna then won 2-0 in Cagliari on 29 October 2024, 2-1 at home on 2 March 2025, and 2-0 in Cagliari again on 19 October 2025, that last one with the opening goal arriving before half-time.

The two most relevant to a home-win selection are the pair played in Bologna: 2-1 and 2-1. Both were won, neither was comfortable, and both went to a single goal. The three away fixtures in the sequence have actually been the cleaner Bologna performances — two 2-0 wins and one defeat — which is a quirk that turns out to sit alongside a wider pattern in this season's numbers.

Bologna finished ninth last season on 62 points, with 16 wins, 14 draws and 57 goals scored. Cagliari were 16th on 36 points, nine wins from 38, with 40 scored and 56 conceded.

Thirty-four games into the current campaign Bologna are again ninth, this time on 48 points, from 14 wins, six draws and 14 defeats. Their goal difference is plus one — 42 scored, 41 conceded — a far flatter profile than last season's, when they took 62 points and scored 57. Cagliari are 16th on 36 points from nine wins, nine draws and 16 defeats, 36 scored and 49 conceded.

Bologna's last five before this round: a 0-2 home defeat to Lazio on 22 March, 2-1 at Cremonese on 5 April, 2-0 at home to Lecce on 12 April, 0-2 at Juventus on 19 April and 0-2 at home to Roma on 25 April. Two wins, three defeats, and in each of the three defeats they failed to score.

Cagliari's five: a 0-1 home defeat to Napoli on 20 March, 1-2 at Sassuolo on 4 April, 1-0 at home to Cremonese on 11 April, 0-3 at Inter on 17 April and 3-2 at home to Atalanta on 27 April. Two wins and three defeats as well, with both wins coming at home and the most recent of them against a side sitting seventh.

The home and away split is the single most important number on this page, and it runs against the pick. Bologna's 17 home league games have produced six wins, two draws and nine defeats, with 16 goals scored and 20 conceded. Their 17 away games have produced eight wins, four draws and five defeats, with 26 scored and 21 conceded. Bologna have been a better team on the road all season, by some distance, and the fixture in front of us is at home.

Cagliari's split is more conventional: six wins, four draws and seven defeats at home against three wins, five draws and nine defeats away, and they have conceded 29 in those 17 away games against 20 at home. Their three most recent away trips brought three defeats, two goals scored and eight conceded. Whatever Cagliari have managed this season, they have not managed it away from Sardinia.

Motivation is the factor that most obviously favours the visitors. Cagliari are 16th on 36 points with four rounds remaining and the bottom three below them — this is a survival fixture for them in a way it is not for anyone in red and blue. Bologna, ninth on 48, are too far back for Europe and far too far clear of trouble to be anxious. A Sunday lunchtime kick-off in early May with one side playing for its division and the other for nothing is not the setup that flatters a short-priced favourite.

The one structural point in Bologna's favour beyond the head-to-head is scoring opportunity. Cagliari have conceded at a rate close to 1.7 a game on their travels, and Bologna, for all their home problems, have scored 42 across the season — a higher total than the visitors have managed and enough to punish a back line that has been beaten regularly on the road.

There is a case here and it is worth stating fully before we admit its limits. Bologna have won four of the last five against these opponents and have not lost to them at home in this sequence, they are 12 points and seven places better off in the table, and Cagliari's away record — three wins in 17, nine defeats, 29 conceded — is much the weaker half of a poor season.

The limits are equally clear. Backing a home win from a side whose home record is six wins in 17, and whose last three home matches read 0-2, 2-0 and 0-2, is betting against the most specific evidence we have. Bologna have failed to score in three of their last five. The price, 1.55, sits in the band our published record has handled worst, and 1X2 is not the market where our numbers have held up.

We are with Bologna Win at 1.55 and high confidence, and that rating is carried by the table gap and the head-to-head rather than by anything in Bologna's home form, which does not support it.

The thing that beats it is a Cagliari point. A side fighting for survival, with nine draws already this season and a defence that has kept things close at times, visiting a home team that has lost nine at home and drawn only twice, is a very plausible way for a short-priced favourite to come unstuck.