Category: Football trading strategies
Sunday Soccer Stats
These stats are brought to your by our friends over at Football Form Labs. Check out their site and the powerful software that sits behind these comments. Football form labs is on offer at the moment, big savings available during August.
Man City v Chelsea, Sun 16:00
Man City have been made favourites for the title after their comfy win in the opening round while Chelsea could only pick up a point at home. While City looked impressive against …
Knee jerk reaction to new football season
Not a trick question, but how many games are there in the season?
Well there are 38 in the premier league and 46 in the other three tiers. So if you win the first match of the season what impact would that have on your chances? Not much you would think. Three points divided by 38 isn’t exactly a large number, but last weekend we saw quite a large reaction to some mundane first day results.
Chelsea’s difficulty in breaking …
My job as a football data scout
When you look on Betfair you will see a graphic, this graphic is telling you things like ‘Dangerous attack’. Corner, substitution or goal. Lots of bookmakers use this service now and a lot of them, including Betfair, use it to manage markets automatically. If you ever wondered where this info comes from, or why a match ‘losses its feed’ or experiences ‘technical difficulties’ read on…..
How I got a job as a scout
In the couple of years when I …
Saturday Soccer Stats
Saturday Soccer stats is back and more will follow this season as we have been busy at work during the off season. Ratings will follow later. We are just slightly behind where we need to be at the moment on some new stuff. But it’s probably not a problem as you are no doubt getting drowned in other stuff today! We have done some excellent work in the off season. Tomorrow on the blog, something really interesting for you; today, …
How to win the league
As the new season is upon us all football fans up and down the country will no doubt have fresh hopes about what the season will bring. Transfers have been done and hopes raised. But what is it that makes a team successful? What is the most defining characteristic?
The defining characteristic
As is well known, a lot of club revenue gets spent on wages to attract top players. This is in the hope that buying talent buys performances. Quite …
Charity shield
This write up is brought to your by our friends over at Football Form Labs. Check out their site and the powerful software that sits behind these comments.
The Ashes may be in full swing but the Premier League season is just around the corner and Sunday’s traditional curtain raiser sees Chelsea and Arsenal give a preview of what to expect in the coming months.
It’s been almost four years since the Gunners last took down Chelsea but with …
An evening off?
The Sussex stakes at Goodwood yesterday proved to be a very interesting market. I posted all of the charts from that race on a Facebook page for you to have a look at, but I felt this was one of the most readable markets of the week so far. Most of the other racing yesterday was a little bit quiet, but Galway gives a boost in the evening.
Today we have an interesting card as Galway is running during the …
The rise of football analytics
Back in the late eigthies and early nineties when I was trying to win the football pools, nobody really understood what was going through my head.
Not interested
I remember writing to a football magazine and explaining to them how I carefully mapped out what happens during a match. I carefully laid out an extensive document talking about how the time of the goal influences the outcome of a match and how a red card can significantly alter that match …
Early season expectations
A interesting write up brought to your by our friends over at Football Form Labs. Check out their site and the powerful software that sits behind these comments.
[Peter – I’ve also looked into the start of the season for opportunities to lay or back teams with difficult or easy starts. Bournemouth and Norwich have a fair start but descend into some really tough fixtures as the season warms up. You can use this information and the sort of …
Champions league final
Another excellent write up brought to your by our friends over at Football Form Labs. Check out their site and the powerful software that sits behind these comments.
Saturday evening in Berlin will see what is undoubtedly the showpiece event of this year’s football calendar as Barcelona and Juventus clash having disposed of Bayern Munich and Real Madrid between them in Europe and dominated their respective domestic leagues. Indeed, the aforementioned …
FA Cup final special
I was going to write up the FA Cup final and then this arrived. An excellent write up brought to your by our friends over at Football Form Labs. Check out their site and the powerful software that sits behind these comments.
FA Cup Final: Arsenal v Aston Villa (Sat, 17:30)
Tim Sherwood will be up against the club that he supported as a boy in Saturday’s FA Cup final at Wembley as his Villa side take on last …
Saturday Soccer Stats
With three games remaining this is the definition of a ‘six-pointer’ as a win for either side could well prove the death blow to the other’s hopes of survival, and if Burnley lose they will definitely be down this weekend.
Hull were outplayed by Arsenal on Monday but they had won back-to-back matches prior to that and their recent home form is quite good. They’ve won three of their last six at the KC …
Saturday Soccer Stats
Spurs salvaged a draw at Southampton last weekend to maintain their sixth position in the standings and they remain hopeful of finishing fifth after Liverpool’s midweek loss at Hull. Man City, meanwhile, are back up to second following their rather lucky win over Aston Villa. Of course Villa are in good form and did recently end Spurs’ 10 match unbeaten streak at home.
Spurs started the season poorly at White Hart Lane, losing …
Permutations at the ready
Bournemouth are at home to Bolton this evening, a win will see them get promoted. Well I say that, but a win would put them three points ahead of rivals with a vastly superior goal difference. As good as a promoted.
There are a number of permutations available for the adventurous this evening. Bournemouth are 1.30’s for the match and 1.10ish for promotion. Backing them for the match but going against promotion could prove useful. Of course they could draw …
Saturday Soccer Stats
With six games remaining Barcelona have the advantage in the title race against Real Madrid. But it’s only a slender lead and while Espanyol have tended to be woeful at this time of year in recent seasons – in their final eight games since 2009/10 their record is W7-D11-L24 with a greater than 50% loss if you’d backed them in all those matches – you can guarantee they’ll be motivated for this clash.
Unfortunately …
Going to the wire
It’s a fascinating season in the Championship this year and it’s going to wire!
The championship is always ultra competitive, unlike the premier league most years, and this often throws up some interesting scenarios. The prize on offer, promotion to the premiership is such a large one, that clubs will spend or ‘fight like beavers’, to get a chance of the riches on offer.
This year we are only three games away from deciding which two lucky teams will get …
Finding value in a football match
Not so long ago I tweeted the following: –
Tonight Bournemouth play Reading away but there is an interesting metric going on tonight. Reading are reasonably, though not entirely clear, of relegation in the Championship. But more importantly they are only 90 minutes away from an FA Cup final.
Bournemouth are in the position of being in complete control of their destiny at the top of the division. If they win every match remaining they will be in the premier …
Manchester Derby
The Manchester clubs come into the derby having experienced contrasting fortunes in recent weeks. Comparisons between Van Gaal’s side and David Moyes’ team at the same stage last season are now long gone and the Dutchman seems to have put his stamp on the side after a turbulent start to the season. Pellegrini, on the other hand, is looking anything but secure in his position as manager of City, who look destined …
How to treat teams with nothing to play for
As we approach the business end of the season, with titles being decided, clubs scrambling to achieve European qualification and some fighting for their lives to avoid relegation, in each of Europe’s top leagues there will be a group of teams that don’t fit into any of the aforementioned categories. They are far enough clear of the relegation zone to not be concerned, while the European spots are out of their grasp in the number of games remaining and these …
Saturday Soccer Stats
Arsenal get the chance to all but confirm their top four finish with the lunchtime kick-off on Saturday as they host a Liverpool side that stand six points below them with just eight games remaining. Given their superior goal difference that is effectively a 6.5 point advantage and Liverpool simply have to win here if they are to claim a Champions League finish this term.
Liverpool will need to overturn a poor recent record
Sunday Soccer Stats
Sunday Soccer Stats
Chelsea come into this game on the back of a thoroughly disappointing result and performance against PSG in midweek, while Southampton’s schedule has been much easier without the rigours of European football or domestic cup ties. They beat Crystal Palace last weekend in what was a much needed win after defeats against West Brom and Liverpool. Chelsea will be looking to maintain their comfortable position at the top of the league, while Southampton will …
Has Manuel Pellegrini got Manchester City’s Tactics Right?
Saturday Soccer Stats – Do refs affect goals?
With QPR having lost six of their last seven matches things are looking bad for the promoted side, especially as they only have two remaining home games against current bottom-half teams and those are
Nailed on Lay Bet
I jest slightly, but there is probably a deeper message here. Rather than tip tap away for 1/2 hour to bring you this rather startling comment from a trader I thought I would do a video about it, Enjoy!
Saturday Soccer Stats
These stats are brought to your by our friends over at Football Form Labs. Check out their site and the powerful software that sits behind these comments
PREVIEW: Sampdoria v Genoa (Sat, 19:45)
It’s another weekend with few high profile clashes across Europe but one game that is sure to be full of passion is the Derby della Lanterna in Genoa. Things have calmed down a bit recently between these sides, with just two red cards in the last …
Luck of the draw
The FA Cup fifth round is upon us and unlike previous years the competition has been very interesting so far.
A raft of premiership clubs have already been dumped out of the competition and that’s changed the shape a bit. In the fifth round this year the premier league clubs account for 96% of the market. This is lower than previous years which have been 98.76%, 98.36% and 99.30%.
So for the first time in a few years that percentage …
Saturday soccer stats – Local derby special
These stats are brought to your by our friends over at Football Form Labs. Check out their site and the powerful software that sits behind these comments
The North London Derby kicks off the Premier League weekend and both sides come into this game on the back of impressive results. Arsenal thumped Villa 5-0 at the Emirates while Spurs won convincingly away against a rejuvenated West Brom following the appointment of Tony Pulis. …
Saturday Soccer Stats
These stats are brought to your by our friends over at Football Form Labs. Check out their site and the powerful software that sits behind these comments
PREVIEW: Chelsea v Man City (Sat, 17:30)
This week’s Saturday Night Football sees reigning champions Man City travel to league leaders Chelsea. Following their shock 4-2 defeat at home to Bradford in the FA Cup, Chelsea needed extra-time to see off Liverpool in the League Cup in midweek, but the talking-point from …
Trading Relegation markets
I recently did a piece of relegation markets, concerning manager sackings which often occur at Christmas and new player arrivals / departures in the new year.
I have written a short piece for Betfair and a longer one for Racing Ahead magazine, but I think the video I did on You Tube is probably the best overall summary. You can view it here, or I have embedded it at the end of this video.
To supplement this video you may …
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