Tag: football
The maths behind penalities – Part One
Groups stages, tight games, can’t afford to lose, Germany, England. This must only add up to one thing, penalties!
Are we going to suffer again, will there be the same agony as in prior years? Penalties is another area I have looked at and I think the findings may be of use to any prospective England goalkeeper facing a penalty, football traders may also benefit.
First off, you can reach some easy conclusions. From spot to net, the ball will …
That match
Given the gloom and doom I am almost tempted to back England this evening. But much of that depends on price and what the team looks like when it is announced. The match is priced for 2.56 goals with a 1.60 advantage to England, yeah right! England just haven’t looked a potent threat upfront and I think it’s optimistic to imagine a free flowing high scoring game, lets hope I am wrong!
If you look at the world cup so …
Not a joke
Honestly, not a joke; but this is the book I am reading at the moment just before I go to bed. It’s actually a really good read and highly recommended for sports traders!
1.05 about to be turned over?
Should England pack up and come home? Traded at 1.05 to qualify last night must have those backers quivering. After failing to beat Algeria, which most teams in the English football league could surely achieve, has there ever been a more defining moment in English national football?
For many, many years we have had loads of great individuals but seemingly no team. Last night showed this up in clear light again and surely the time has come to stop picking …
Blunt start by England
In fact, most of the matches have been pretty blunt, which seems to often be the case in the world cup early matches. England had a great chance to really get off to a good start after taking the lead so early, but I don’t feel there were aggressive enough going forward. England now need to convincingly win the next two games or they could end up on the wrong side of the draw.
No doubt the following image will …
How much!
It was interesting to read this article today which details just how much money each premiership club collects each year.
It’s amazing to think that any club could go into administration with so much money being dished out each year. Couple this with parachute payments and it seems that the premier league is clearly set to pull away from the old football league in terms of development. There is an interesting graphic here that clearly illustrates the amount of the …
FA Cup Final
A curious one this year. Chelsea are on for the double and will surely try their best to get it. Pompey have performed miracles to get the final and wont want to lose it. Chelsea are at a very short price so I’d be nervous mopping up at that price.
Curiously we have profiled this match and it has come out very similar to the Chelsea vs Stoke match on the 25/4/10. Of course Chelsea won this 7-0! All similar …
Europa league final
Who would put it past Fulham to end the season in glory tonight? Shakhtar Donetsk, Juventus and Hamburg have all been beaten by Fulham en route to the final, with just Atletico Madrid now standing in their way.
The match itself is priced for a low scoring affair with a slight edge to Athletico. The market is pricing in a paltry 2.40 goals, which means the draw should be a likely result for 90mins. I predict if you played this …
Would you back the draw at 1.30?
If a football match was near the end, perhaps ten or fifteen minutes or so, 1.28 may represent value. But before the match has started, no way! Mathematically speaking it’s highly improbable for the draw to be priced at 80% certainty in a fair match. However these strange odds seem to occur often at the end of the Italian football season. Not all of them play out as the odds intend but it’s certainly very strange to keep seeing such …
Barcelona vs. Inter Milan
I have to admit to being underwhelmed by the champions league this year. There haven’t been many superb matches, certainly not from a trading perspective. Last night wasn’t much different when Bayern Munich demolished Lyon without so much as a last desperate effort from the side that was about to go out. It’s all been a bit disappointing as I love strong incentives to win and things like late goals, that’s where the really big results come from.
The market …
Start of season, end of season
As you are probably aware from my posts, there is nothing more I like that a football match with a strong incentive behind it. At the start of a season, form is difficult to spot early on. Though promotion and relegation isnt’ so tricky. But it’s the end of the season when things really begin to happen. With many matches classed as ‘six pointers’ for one reason or another, this time of year has always been a fertile hunting ground. …
Make cash from ash
I hope you are not one of many being inconvenienced by the erupting volcano in Iceland, or the national air bodies, depending on how you see it. The office is quieter this Monday thanks to the failure of quite a few people failing to return from overseas after the school Easter holidays. My wife spoke to a friend last night, still stuck in the US with little hope of return this week. Scheduled ETA at least two weeks away, I …
Bit of a Kop out
No surprise to see Tom Hicks and George Gillett exit stage left at Liverpool. Struggling to refinance their debt they have to find a viable exit, but it’s a terrible time to sell. Liverpool are heading for a poor season and the attractiveness of the club must have been dented by their lack of success, not only this season but in prior seasons also. For the amount of wages they pay they really should be performing better, but I am …
Italian end of season matches
Since my first posting some time ago there have been plenty more Italian matches with strange prices. However, not all have ended up with the predicted result. There appears to be a process of reversion to mean going on! I was lucky on this one, as rather than backing the draw I opted to back Lazio, who went on to win. Because of the propensity for these matches to be unpredictable I wonder whether an element of this unusual pricing …
Even odder
Thanks for all the people that emailed in about the Chievo vs Catania match. Many different views and opinions on this match. Also thanks to my Italian friends that got in contact to talk about this particular game.
No surprise that the match ended up 1-1 as strongly predicted by the market. 95% of all the money on the match was traded on the draw which is pretty much unheard of in a soccer match. There is vigorous discussion on …
Very odd
Not often I talk about Italian football but this one can’t go by without comment.
Chievo vs. Catania
Cheivo are 3.15 to win this match, nothing unusual there. But the really unusual thing this that the draw is priced at odds on. You don’t see that very often, in fact, you never see it. Draw’s occur fairly randomly and the odds for the draw is one of the easiest things to predict. I’ve never seen fit to predict a draw …
Europa League
More fun planned this evening with an infinite range of permutations available on each match. But the two English matches do look the most interesting.
Fulham are 3-1 down, but a home goal would create a massive difference to that score line and you get the feeling anything is possible with Fulham. I wouldn’t bet against Fulham pulling it off this evening. The match is priced for 2.6 goals with a slight advantage to the home team. I think that’s …
Broke it like Beckham
It was sad to see Beckham break down in that match last night. The good news for England fans is that it doesn’t seem to have affected the odds on England winning the world cup. Though at 7.00 these seem pretty short I think!
I really felt Beckham’s pain last night because I have suffered the same injury, I hope his doesn’t have the impact it had on me. I used to be very sporty and where ever I went …
Classic set up
A wonderful set up occurred in the FA Cup clash between Reading and Aston Villa this afternoon. Against the odds, Reading took a 2-0 lead againsts premiership outfit Villa. The teams went off for half time in distinctly different moods. A break in play is the perfect opportunity for teams to turn things around and that Villa did. Rejuvenated from their half time talk it wasn’t look before Villa were suddenly 3-2 in the lead. You could have backed them …
Europa league matches
Had some fun last Thursday messing around on the Europa league matches. I like the Europa league as they break down the matches into two blocks. One going off at 18:00 UK time and the remainder at 20:05. This gives you two cracks at the whip at trading them. This week was also the second leg of a knockout competition, which I prefer. I also tried an experimental strategy to small stakes on Thursday and that is what this post …
Portsmouth go into administration
Further to my post some time ago Portsmouth officially went into administration this afternoon and almost certain relegation. Hopefully you jumped on board following my post a little while ago. One of the lowest risk trades of the season!
While it’s not pleasant to see clubs get into trouble, the economics of football are astonishing. It’s quite amazing to see how poor the economics of most clubs are, but even the top teams are not in a very good shape. …
Champions league trading
Porto vs. Arsenal
Priced at a lowly 2.30 goals, this is fairly typical construction for a match of this type. Porto are priced as having a slight edge but only just. The market is pretty much spot on in terms of pricing.
B.Munich vs. Fiorentina
A less competitive clash according to the market. Priced at 2.90 with Munich having a 1.30 goal advantage. Under 2.50 goals offers long term value, I would have priced at 2.14 vs. 2.22 in the …
Quiet transfer deadline day
Often the transfer deadline throws up a few opportunities, due to the high correlation between wages and league position. A buy or sell can translate to a corresponding improvement or decline between now and the end of the season. This year it was very quiet. The only thing of note was Portsmouth net sale which isn’t going to help their prospects of avoiding the drop. If you followed my advice of a little while ago you should have a healthy …
FA CUP value
Where is the value in today’s FA Cup?
To be honest any recommendations would come with a large pinch of salt. While predicting matches in the same league is quite a straightford process, doing the same in a cup competition can be pretty tricky. If there are any matches I am likely to get caught out on, its quite likely to be a cup competition, especially in the early rounds. As such I’ll do some simple things when the screen …
Over / Under 10.5 goals
You don’t see that market very often, but you did last night. What a remarkable match, Aston Villa 6 Blackburn 4! At 0-2 down Villa were matched in volume at 10’s, this match was a trading bonanza! The market was just slightly out on this one forecasting just 2.60 goals. Excluding specifics of the match itself, I can only find three 6-4’s in my recent detailed database of 10,189 matches. So its around at least a 3400-1 shot. Great entertainment …
Portsmouth – To be relegated
I’ve had a lot of fun on this market in the past and there is another potential opportunity. Portsmouth already looked pretty doomed given their position at the bottom of the table at this time of year. On top of that you have players low on confidence and a financial position that is, at best, precarious. At 1.30’s that information seems to already be discounted into the market.
But, HMRC has now been given the go ahead for their winding …
Trade of the week
One of my favourite types of trades appeared this week. The trade where you look at one market but actually trade another. These opportunities appear all the time but typically in knockout competitions and ante post markets where a result somewhere will definitely affect other prices in a same or similar market.
This week was a little more clear cut but unusual. ITV decided to cover the Liverpool vs Reading FA CUP match. It had all the signs of the …
Time is money
Odds can move in mysterious ways in a football / soccer match but generally they are quite predictable. Using Soccer Mystic to model the likely behaviour is a good way to come up with strategies that could generate a profitable scenario. Is this video I demonstrate one of those scenarios which can be used on any match that gets turned in-play.
Has this happened before?
An oft quoted phrase.
But, Man U 0-1 Leeds United. That was a big turned up for the books wasn’t it? Or was it?
Well you don’t need to wind back far to see the last time a similar thing happened. I looked at matches where the home team were priced between 1.25 to 1.30 for a home win. Curiously, where this involved an English team playing a foreign team, the English teams were very dominant. Focusing just on domestic …
FA Cup value?
In the absence of horse racing today I’ve taken a look at the FA Cup fixtures this afternoon. Subject to team sheets there appears to be a lot of potential value in the Reading vs. Liverpool fixture this afternoon. I’ve explained my full rationale on the forum.
Of course, just seeing value doesn’t mean the result will come in. But over time hunting for value is always a good strategy. If the weather persists in being so cold, I’ll …
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