UEFA : Updated European Favourite Analysis

One win for the favourite and a rare win for an underdog in the two European football finals from the weekend but no large profits.

Depending on when you backed Bayern Munich, you may even have made a small loss with the price on Bayern Munich shortening to odds-on in some places, although Pinnacle closed at around 2.02 and 2.14 was the price I took on Betfair.

Here are the numbers updated, and not a pretty sight for those who prefer the underdog in finals:

There were 76 knock-out round matches, fewer than the usual 90 owing to the change in format to single elimination in later rounds due to the pandemic. 

In the Champions League since 2004, the ROI when backing the favourite is 3.6% which increases to 7.8% in Big-5 matches.  

Backing the favourite in every knock-out match this season (Champions League and Europa League) had an ROI of 20.2%, and in Big-5 matches, of 40%. (Big-5 in this context means matches featuring clubs from England, France, Germany, Italy and Spain). There were no intra-league matches this season, and you shouldn't need to be told that one season is a small sample size, so don't expect those 20% / 40% returns every year.

Even before the 2019-20 competitions were concluded, the 2020-21 campaigns are already underway, and I'll probably have some more stats later.