What’s working in Euro 2016
As we move into the knockout stage, let’s review what’s happened in the Euro’s so far from a market perspective.
Turnover
The first thing to note is that the volumes are down a fair bit from Euro 2012 on Betfair. In 2012 in the group stages the lowest turnover match was £7.7m before the off and £17.8m at the end of the match. This year it was a paltry £1.6m and £3.3m, slightly lower than in 2012! I think it’s best to describe these numbers as ‘disappointing’. The maximum amount matched before the off was £8.1m, just over the lowest in 2012.
If you look at the proportion of pre-off to in-play money there is a step change from 2012. In 2012 45% of total volume was matched before the off and the remaining 55% in-play. In 2016 that’s slipped to 35/65.
Feel free to come up with opinions for this in the comments section!
Time and date bias
Does the start time or day make a difference to turnover? The day of week didn’t seem to, but looking at the start time of match volume was lower on the 5pm kick offs.
The England effect
Where you will almost certainly get an effect is in the amount of, usually stupid, money on England. This has repeated in this tournament with the average England match reaching £8.1m before kick off and £19.2m at the end of the match. This is against £4.1m & £11.7m overall.
If you look at the ‘home’ nations or nearest neighbours in terms of Ireland. There isn’t a demonstrable similar effect. Nothing stands out or suggests there is increased volume.
Value
So far laying the favourite would have worked. The market priced the favourites at a 52.66% chance and they won 47% of the time. The outsiders were priced with only a 19.7% chance but won 22.2% of the time. The draw was 28% and 30% respectively. Draws tend to average out quite quickly on football.
The favourite has scored first 50% of the time and the outsider 39% of the time. Roughly where we would expect.
Goals
Up to the end of the group stage, 1.92 goals were scored on average. The market predicted 2.29, so there has been excellent value in the unders market. I’d imagine the significance of the knockout stages will ensure the low scoring continues.
Luck of the draw
Results so far have ended up splitting the draw in a curious way, that’s had an impact on the winner odds. Croatia’s standard of play and the luck of draw has resulted in their price shift the most from 26 to 10 a move of 6%. France has gone in the opposite direction from 4.4 to 5.80 or -5.5%. Belgium and Wales have moved 4.8% & 2.4%, being the other significant movers. England are more or less where they started.
If you want to know the impact of Hodgson failure to really go for the win in the last group match shows up on when you look at the top vs bottom half of the draw. The top half has improved their overall chances of winning the tournament by 17.07% in aggregate, the bottom half has declined 10.75%
I know which half I would prefer to be in!
Money where you mouth is
If we look at matched volumes now and compare it with the start of the tournament people have been most active on France, Germany, Spain and England. People are not really backing much else heavily. But of course, you have other bias in play here as well. It’s Croatia and Belgium next with half that volume, then a little money for Portugal and Italy and little elsewhere.The only notable shifts in
The only notable shifts in market volume have come for Croatia. The top half of the draw is likely to benefit going forward. Any reasonable ranked team getting through will see their odds shorten a fair bit.
After all, they will be getting closer and closer to the final where the odds will tend to reflect that, even through luck, a team could win the final match. Plenty of evidence with Greece and Denmark that it can be done.
The top half of the draw could be dutched for 39% of the book before the start of today’s matches.
Category: Football trading strategies, Trading strategies
