21 goals in the six Round of 16 matches played so far, an average of 3.5 goals per game, means that 2018 is on track to beat the modern day record for this round of 24, (90 minutes only), set in 1994.
Some way short of the 40 goals at this stage in 1934, or 1938's 37 goals which included a 5:5 draw between Brazil and Poland, a walkover for Sweden, and two replays with Switzerland and Cuba needing a second game to get past Germany and Romania respectively, but more goals is not good for the Draw, as readers will know.
Two more HT Draws yesterday mean 5 out of 6 winners so far, with two full-time Draws. While the Half-Time Draw can be odds-on, e.g. 1.91 for the Sweden v Switzerland game today, it can also be a lot higher. Yesterday I was matched at 2.42 on the Brazil v Mexico game and 2.58 on Belgium v Japan.
There have now been over 200 knockout games in the World Cup since its inception, and the Half-Time Draw numbers over the years, complete with the Draws broken out by score, are:
Note that in earlier years, and so far this year, the 1:1 was more frequent a Half-Time score than the 0:0, but since 1986 has been very much a rarer outcome. If the 2:2 is your preferred Half-Time Draw score, good luck. You'll need it.
1 comment:
Interesting article. I had been looking at World Cup data coming into the last World Cup but not as deeply as you I must admit.
I do think international tournament football has generally become more cagey (boring) in recent times hence I started looking for some angles.
Since the World Cup has gone to the last 16 knockout format in 1986 there has been a trend (I find) in the Quarter Finals (until then there was a second group phase then directly onto the Semi Finals in 82 or even the final prior to that).
11 of the 32 games since the new format have gone to penalty shootouts.
A very small sample I grant you but there has not been a tournament since this format started where a shootout has not taken place. Given that the odds are just under 3.0. The last tournament I decided to have a play in 2014. The odds for a shootout were about the 6.0 on average. However, the odds became better by dutching the individual teams to win on pens with different bookies rather than backing the market of simply going to pens. The 3rd game in 2014 was a winner so I stopped at the winner.
Sadly this tournament not many bookies are offering this bet at this stage and the odds are a bit shorter so the dutching the 2 teams not an option. However, there is 1 bookie still offering the market either team to win on pens and with the QF's odds ranging from 4.0 to 6.5 I'm backing this trend to continue on a small sample and will be, again stopping at winner (hopefully). I might have egg on my face if no pens this time around but these will be my only wagers of the World Cup so I can live with only 4 losing wagers. NB keep up the good work with the blog.
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