It's a Knockout

The Africa Cup of Nations Round of 16 is now complete, and three draws from the eight matches means that the record for this stage of International Tournaments now looks like this:

This includes the Cameroon v Comoros game which started after at least eight people had died in a crush with the hosts at an unofficial 1.05 and the Draw at 14.93.

In International Knockout matches, (or any matches for that matter), when the fair probability of the Draw is under 20%, backing the Draw generally isn't a great idea with the loss from 30 matches 11.42 points.

At least one reader is paying attention, and the Quarter-Final stage is usually good for the Draw also.

Fotballinvest tweeted:

I promised to take a look, hoping that perhaps the markets have settled down after teams have adjusted to the new rule and new ball and Killer Sports are back, albeit in testing mode. 

The average number of points this season is currently 217.2, which means that the steady increase in points since 2011 is over. The rule change mentioned in this post which was introduced to...

discourage offensive players from making "overt, abrupt or abnormal non-basketball moves"

has clearly had a significant impact. At the start of the season, the Overs System Total was set to 234.5 points, and while this has a strike rate of 60% for the season, with only 10 qualifiers, this isn't much good to us.

In all matches this season, the Under has been the outcome in 52.9% of matches, so anyone playing the Overs has been swimming against the tide. However, the edge to Unders appears to have evaporated as the season has unfolded, with the percentage up to, and including, November 5th peaking at 65.2%. Since then. Overs has been the winner 50.2% of the time. For the rest of November, the split was exactly 50/50, while in December it was 53.7% and so far in January, 51.2%.

The logic behind behind backing Overs when the Total is 'high' (high being a relative term) is that unsophisticated bettors are put off from backing Overs when they view the Total as, well, high. It's early days, but if the average for this season is going to be around the 217 mark, then perhaps we will find an opportunity shooting for a few points above this.

Since that early November date, backing Overs when the total is greater than 223 has a 53.8% record, (64-52-3) and when the Road team is a Western Conference team (remember in the NBA that conferences are not created equal), the record is 58.6%. 

So to answer the original question, "is the NBA Overs back now?", the verdict is a cautious yes, but with less than three months data, tread carefully. 

In the NFL tomorrow, only one team will qualify as a Small Road 'Dogs System, with the San Francisco 49ers getting 3.5 points against the Los Angeles Rams. The two teams played each other just three weeks ago in LA, with the 49ers winning in overtime. They also beat (thrashed?) the Rams at home in November 31-10, and so two of the Rams five defeats this season have been to their California rivals.