Tag: soccer
Any two from five
Calculating combinations was the first place I started when I went on this long journey from a very young age. The intention back then was to win the football pools and combinations were an important part of spreading risk around my selections. Today, any two from five teams could be relegated and that means that they are ten different ways for this to happen, see the following ‘any two from five’ list. You would list the teams in ascending order …
How to play the play offs
I was asked for an opinion recently on the championship play offs. I tipped a Reading vs Swansea final with Reading likely to edge it. So far so good, as both Swansea and Reading are through, so how did I get it right?
It’s quite simple really, “Form” is the answer. When you look at play off success over the years then form stands out as the key determinate. Form teams do well in the play offs on average and …
FA CUP final
Is it just me or does the FA Cup feel like it’s losing is significance? Maybe it’s the dominance by big teams, maybe it’s the fact that this season the premiership and the champions league have pushed it around a little? Anyhow that’s not to detract too much from this famous competition. I am sure either supporters will be rightly proud if their team pull of a win.
The market is pricing in 2.50 goals with an advantage of 0.50 …
Match of the season
A tantalising match this afternoon between Man Utd and Chelsea and the market is being cautious by pricing up Man Utd at 2.34 for the win. I would have priced Chelsea near 4.00 for a win here, but with so much at stake; its probably right for the price to be a bit shorter. The market is priced for 2.50 goals with 1.30 going to Man Utd.
Home advantage is historically 0.40 goals so if you take that out, the …
Busy day
Looking forward to a busy day today.
Promotion and relegation battles will be settled on the football pitches today, that always throws up opportunities. There is nothing like career death to focus the mind of a highly paid footballer. I’m looking for an outside chance today. I’ll probably spread around my options to even things out. Did you know that Bet Angel can monitor and fire in bets across multiple markets almost simultaneously? This is ideal for football where matches …
May the 4th be with you
Hmm, not sure Ferguson is making the right decision to rest players ahead of tonight’s Champions league semi final. OK a two goal lead should be plenty but a goal for Schalke could really put the cat amongst the pigeons. I guess he will bench key players and bring them on if it merits it?
I had a quick look on the DB and hunted for Man Utd matches at home priced between 1.50-1.60. It threw up five recent matches. …
Forgone conclusion?
You can’t help but think, like the rest of the community, that the two champions league semi finals are forgone conclusions. I looked at the weekend markets and curiously all teams lost, so no clues in there. But it was possible to start opposing Man Utd after it dawned to me that they may have half an eye on the semi final.
The market is discounting a win by one goal for Barcelona tonight but much depends on whether Real …
Farcelona
That was the word on the street after the sending off last night. It seems a common trait to dislike success, but you can’t escape the fact that Barcelona have proved on many occasions that they are by far the best team in the tournament and did so again last night. It’s just such a shame they have often degraded their performances with gamesmanship.
It’s also a shame that the first leg was a duplicate of the other semi final, …
Schalke vs Man Utd review
The market was predicting a low scoring affair but it was obvious, fairly early on, that the match was likely to be anything but. Man Utd’s pace seemed to surprise Schalke and plenty of chances were created.This produced the unusual effect of there being little price decay in the under 2.5 goals market.
Come half time there were plenty of shots but no goals so a back of overs was a natural step. It took a while be eventually there …
Nothing’s impossible
That has to be the message that Harry Redknapp will send to his team this evening. But just what chance does he have?
When you can lay Real Madrid at 1.02 to qualify, so the market thinks Harry has less than a 2% chance. But memories are still fresh for me with that remarkable run Middlesbrough had in the UEFA cup a few years ago.
Spurs are priced at 3.35 for a win, the match is only priced for …
Showdown
Barcelona are priced for an easy win against Shakhtar and I can’t see beyond that. Barca will want to put this to bed comprehensively in the first leg. However, there are decent trades available for this scenario. Goals give you plenty of scope to hedge good set ups.
Last night’s legs were uncompetitive and the return legs look a formality now, which is a shame. The same can’t be said of tonights showdown at Stamford Bridge. I would have priced …
When Harry met Jose
Home wins look the order of the day for the first leg of the champions league this evening. It’s difficult to see beyond that, but as we seen already, anything is possible. When Harry last visited Madrid he got mugged, most Spurs fans will hope it doesn’t happen again on the field of play.
The pressure has to be on Real Madrid to get a result at home against Champions league novices Spurs. Spurs best chance of progressing has to …
I predict another draw
A cursory glance at the Italian football today reveals two matches were the matched bet volume is 5-6 times greater than normal and draw odds much shorter than expected. I have posted the two matches in question on the forum. I backed Brescia to win against Bologna on Saturday after picking up on activity on that match. Brescia were 2-0 up inside ten minutes, so I traded out at very short odds.
It prompted me to see what happened …
I predict a draw
Hold on, haven’t I posted that before? Has this happened before? Err… yes at the end of each Italian football season. I’m wise to it now!
Part of my preparation for the weekends football fixtures, I suck in all the matches via Bet Angel into a spreadsheet and a couple of pre-set formula’s point out areas of interest. Last night it threw up Padova vs Atalanta as ‘odd’. You can see why on the following graph. The volume of matched …
Tangerine time
Interesting match this evening with Blackpool up against Chelsea. It must seem a long time since Blackpool charged up the league with some notable wins against high profile opposition. Only a couple of points above the drop zone, their focus now must be on the bottom of the league, rather than the top.
I’m not ashamed to say that Blackpool was one of my favourites to get relegated this season. Nothing against Blackpool, who have been very entertaining this season, …
FA Cup
Most of this weekends ties look to have a certain amount of inevitability about them. You would expect to see most of the favourites see off the weaker teams, but I do fancy the look of Stoke vs Brighton.
It has a nice set up to it with Stoke doing ‘OK’ in the Premiership but Brighton going great guns in league one. I reckon the seagulls will really be up for this match and will have the belief they can …
This evenings European football
The two key champions league matches don’t look exciting prospects from my viewpoint. Two home wins on the card and two away teams that will be trying to avoid defeat. The first leg in these cases don’t throw up many clear opportunities usually. It’s the second leg that is often more interesting given what happens in the first.
The match that has caught my eye today is the Aris vs Man City match. Man City are quite short but should …
Football rich list
It is always interesting to read the Deloitte reports. They seem to highlight the significant, and growing, gap between footballs elite clubs and the rest.
Seven of the top ten clubs come from the English premiership. The top clubs even in this elite division are pulling away from the others.
https://www.deloitte.com/view/en_GB/uk/press-release/0966fd0057101210VgnVCM100000ba42f00aRCRD.htm
But there are still a large number of structural issues in the game.
The impact of transfers
Back before the start of the season I tipped a number of teams to struggle and managers likely to leave their jobs, by and large I have been spot on. A couple of surprises, but come the end of the season I’d should be well up on the deal over the course of the season. So, how did I find these opportunities? Just one word, money!
That money makes the world go around is true and none more so in …
Pool lined with gold
What a season Blackpool are having and the tactic when the tangerines are playing is really simple. If they are at large odds at home, back them.
This may sound obvious but if you want to understand the full subtly of this tactic then fire up Soccer Mystic point it to any match where a team is large odds at home and look at what happens to the projected odds in the first half.
You wouldn’t have needed to do …
Adopt Arsenal business model
If you remember this post where I was commenting on how impressed I was with Arsenal’s business model. Well it seems FIFA is as well.
https://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/9358589.stm
I think, for the long term future of the game, it makes sense to engage on sensible terms.
I remember when I was young. I would pay £1.50 to stand on the terraces, stuffing my face with a hot dog, getting smoke wafted in my face, BUT you really could believe that your team …
I predict a draw (Part 3)
Can you guess the outcome of this match? In total £4.1m out of a total of £4.36m traded was on the draw. Remarkable!
I predict a draw (Part 2)
Second part of what will probably be a three part post.
The draw is now trading at a remarkable 1.42 and £2.85m of £3m on the match is on the draw! To put that into perspective only 10% of the money on the Man City vs Everton match is on the draw, a more rational number.
Question now is what sort of a draw will it be. 1-1 is usually the favoured result and that is being backed in as …
I predict a draw (Part 1)
The draw is a “underactive” area of the match odds market. Out of the three outcomes availble, the draw tends to get proportionatly little attention and volume out of the three.
So, a bit of a surprise to see the draw accounting for 96% of the volume in the match. Not only that but even more surprising to see the odds backed in from 3.00 to 1.30, before the off. The italian football market is a curious one isn’t it?…
Europa league ratings
Twelve matches and I reckon there should be around 33/34 goals. It’s tougher at this stage of the tournament as incentives to score can vary and so can the strength of teams put out. So I tend to be less confident at this stage of the tournament. The knockout phase usually brings out better motivation in players.
The three matches I’d be most likely to lean on over 2.5 goals are Stuttgart, Lille and Anderlecht.
The three matches I’d be …
Arsenal the business
If you look at the top of the premiership there is a lot of ‘buying points’ going on. Chelsea and Man City have spent a fortune buying up talent to keep hold of a top four place. Man Utd have also spent a lot, but not as prolifically as the former teams. One likely reason for this is that Man Utd are run as a business, albeit a heavily indebted one. So they can’t afford to run the business in …
Lessons from Liverpool
Tonight we are in the final group stages of the champions league. These matches can throw up some odd results as some have strong incentives to win and others much less so.
Last night the market was pretty stable in the Liverpool vs Aston Villa match. Then the teamsheet came out and there was no Gerrard or Torres on it! You can see the effect this had on the price. It is always worth remembering that while football matches are …
Don’t pay till May
It was only when my favourite football club got relegated that I started playing around in the relegation and promotion markets. Since then it has become a regular stamping ground for me during the season, especially at the start or end. People seem to have this wonderful propensity to put too much emphasis on recent results or events. Either that or they carry hopes that are just clearly out of whack with reality.
So far this year I have made …
Europa league ratings
Just put these on the forum.
It looks like the football will be one of few sports going ahead today, so I may as well make the most of it. We have been very close consistently on the goals tally but this evening poses a few problems given the increased importance of some of the matches. Early goals will most likely produce more goals than forecast due to the incentive to score.
2012 all over again?
Been keeping an eye on the winner of the 2018 world cup bid market. England are shortening up quite quickly and are now favourites to win the tournament. I hope they do, or else I will be a very old man by the time the World Cup tournament eventually comes, if it does at all, to England.
It’s very reminiscent of the London 2012 Olympic bid. Paris were in the lead for ages are looked nailed on to win the …
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