Top Drawer Results

I came across an old (2009) Kevin Pullein piece from the Guardian yesterday while I should have been working. Nothing there that readers of this blog shouldn't already know, and the article shows its age, and the suggestion that the draw is rarely quoted sub 3.4 suggests the draw receives more attention today than may have previously been the case:

• Low-scoring teams are involved in more drawn matches
• Odds offered on draws often represent better value for money

Two factors, above all others, influence the result of a football match – the difference in ability between the two teams and whether they are likely to become involved in a high-scoring or low-scoring contest. The first has been discussed here before. The second is overlooked by some bookmakers and one consequence of their omission is that there is yet another category of games in which the draw is sometimes offered at bigger odds than it should be.

The fewer goals there are likely to be in a match the more likely it becomes that both teams will score the same number. A good way of illustrating this point is with some figures from Premier and Football League games played during the past 10 seasons. The average number of goals scored in those games was 2.55. Overall, 27% of games were drawn. However, low-scoring teams were involved in more stalemates than high-scoring teams.

Teams whose games averaged between 2.5 and 2.6 goals drew 27% of the time. Teams whose games averaged between 2.9 and 3.0 goals drew only 25% of the time. But teams whose games averaged between 2.1 and 2.2 goals drew as much as 31% of the time. You can see that across this range the incidence of draws varied by 6%, depending on whether teams tended to become involved in open or tight contests.

Bookmakers generally ignore the style of a team's play, taking into account only the strength of their play. Consequently, some bookmakers rarely quote a draw at shorter than 12–5 (3.4).

However, there are occasions when the odds should really be shorter – namely, when one or both of the teams has a history of low scores.

Fulham's games this season have averaged only 1.8 goals, less than any other team in the Premier League. It is no coincidence that Fulham have drawn a higher proportion of their games than any other team in the Premier League – 39%. Wycombe's games have averaged 2.0 goals, fewer than any other team in League Two. And they have drawn 39% of their games, the second highest proportion in League Two. When one or both teams have a tendency to become involved in low scores, the draw can sometimes represent value for money.

After a much discussed drought of draws in the top leagues last season, in particular the EPL, Serie A and the Bundeslayga, they are back (with a vengeance) this season - except in Ligue 1. There's always un, as they say in Paris.

It won't last, so don't try this at home, but if you had backed the draw in every EPL game (using Pinnacle's prices) this season, you would be +11.52 points after 70 bets.

If you had been a little smarter and backed only in matches where the draw probability was > 20%, you'd be up a whopping 32.34 points on the season from just 45 bets. Only one draw has come from the 25 longer priced matches - favourite-longshot bias at work, although like gravity, the effect is a little weaker at the outer limits where draw prices are found than it is close to the centre where the hot favourites are merrily orbiting away.

This return is significantly better than the XX Draws' return from this league it must be said, which is looking rather languid at just 3.32 points from 14 matches.  

While the EPL strike rate for draws of 32.9% is at least within the bounds of being reasonable, in the Bundesliga, it is not. Only 63 matches have been played, but the draw percentage is a ridiculous 38.1% (implied price 2.62). Unlike in the EPL, a large number of draws have come from games where you would least expect them. The 22 matches where the draw is priced at 4.0+ would have made 18.28 points, while a benchmark of 'sensible' matches would have made 16.76 points. The XX Draws in this league? Up 7.55 points on 11 selections. This is a league where the draw price is traditionally a lot longer than the other top leagues due to the higher goals per game, (the lowest this season is 3.34) but if that number stays close to 2.60 goals a game (lower than the EPL and La Liga) this season, the carried over draw prices will be rather generous until it starts coming down. 

As for Ligue 1, the draws after 90 games are at a ten tear low. The 10 year average is 30.2%. This season? 23.3%. The strange thing is that goals are not up on previous seasons, so   Backing all draws would have lost 11.02 points. Backing all sensible draws (sub 4.0) would have lost 24.61, so as in Germany, the unlikelier draws are hitting. 6 of the 15 priced over 4.0 came in, for a profit of 13.59 points. 

France has the additional challenge of a lot of too low prices. My XX Draws exclude any price under 3.15, and backing the 14 matches in this range would have lost 7.81 points. The XX Draws are -3.93 in this league from 11 selections.

A lot of ifs, would haves, could haves etc. above, because no one knew at the start of the season that such a set of results would occur and the fact is that the draws will regress to more realistic numbers as the season progresses. That the XX Draws are under-performing the "draws under 4.0 benchmark" is disappointing, but the currently high numbers in the EPL, the Bundesliga and La Liga will come down and likely Ligue 1's will come up.

La Liga isn't one of my favourite leagues, with the perennial overpowering duo of Real Madrid and Barcelona complicating things, but it's interesting that with these two removed, backing every draw in Spain would have made 10.89 points.

I dare say I shall revisit this topic later in the season, because I do like my draws.

Infinite Wisdom

Marty commented on my last post excitement about extremes being seen so far in a cross-section of football:

I would be surprised if you could NOT find a statistic at new highs or lows, given the almost infinite number of statistics one could come up with.

While there are certainly a large number of statistics that one could come up with, I was actually referring to the more major categories of which there are relatively few, i.e. Home wins, Away wins, Draws and Goal Totals rather than hunting around for any old statistical high or low. Indeed, 6:3 away wins are at a high in the EPL this season, but I’m not sure anyone is too interested in that kind of a statistic.

Even if they were, I’m not sure Marty realizes just how big a number infinity is. I’m pretty sure that however you slice and dice the statistics from match results, infinity is unlikely to need a redefinition by mathematicians any time soon.

What I meant to state was that in the nine leagues reviewed, every single one has at least one MAJOR (Win Category) statistic at either an absolute high or low, and that is surprising, even taking the low sample size of this season into account.

Counting the last 10 full seasons, and the current one, we have 11 values, and for the Home wins, the Away wins or the Draws to be either first or last in that eleven in every one of the nine leagues is unusual. Yes, you would expect a few highs and lows to be hit, especially with a low sample size to date, but not as many as we are seeing.

As the season progresses, i.e. the sample size increase, then most of the extremes will likely fall back towards their mean values, but I certainly find it interesting to delve deeper into the numbers, and find for example that home teams in the EPL, La Liga and Serie A are not winning 1:0 as much as they usually do, while in the Bundesliga they are winning by this score twice as often as expected.

Apparently a disappointing World Cup and early exit means a subsequent in a decline in 1:0 Home wins, while winning the World Cup means the opposite?

But wait - League Two is also showing a big (50%) jump in 1:0s this season, and I’m not sure too many teams there went deep into the World Cup!

Perhaps winning the World Cup mean more tired players, and more 0:0 draws. Last season the Bundesliga saw 13 such results, yet with just 20% of this season played, we have already seen 8.

Only a few midweek entries in the FTL, but with fourth-placed Randolph one of the few, I'll post a top-of-the-table update later in the week. The challenge to the numbers was withdrawn, so the table 

Having been thrashed as a no-show by the XX Draws in the first Group game of the Erskine Cup, Skeeve stopped by to say:

I was just wondering if my blog (http://bettingwithskeeve.blogspot.com/) is too portfolio oriented or you don't want to add it to your blog list because of something else. :)

Anyhow, the post about the Friendly Tipster League (I'll have some selections for the Erskine Cup round 2, don't worry:) will be online later this evening or, in the worst case scenario, tomorrow. :)

His second group game is against BettingTools.co.uk in a little over three week's time. The world awaits. I'm not sure I was aware that Skeeve has a blog, but he does and it has been added to the roll.  I saw my name mentioned a couple of times, which shows good taste anyway. We look forward to his comments on the FTL.

Extreme Stats

The FTL Top Ten after Monday's results now looks like this, but note that Trend to end has thrown the Red Flag and is challenging my numbers. I re-checked them, and can't see where I have gone wrong, but at my age, a senior moment is always a distinct possibility. I have sent my numbers to him and await Tore's comments. With over 2,000 selections to date, it's quite possible I will make the odd mistake, but I promise they are unintentional and will be corrected if the error is pointed out in a timely manner.

The break in top league action provides a good opportunity to look at how the leagues are performing this season compared to previous seasons. 

There are some interesting trends being seen with every league (top five in England, plus Serie A, La Liga, Ligue 1 and Bundesliga) having at least one statistic at either a high or a low when compared with the previous 10 seasons. 

That in itself is remarkable enough, but in fact, all but one League has at least two statistics at highs or lows, (although categories are not independent, so that's not necessarily as exciting as it seems), and with 22.6% of the season gone, some of the trends are worth noting. 

In some leagues, the low number of matches played so far could mean that the fixture list has played a part, but it is very strange that so many extremes are being seen.

Havana Good Run

Although there are still three bets still to be settled today, the outcomes won't make a significant change to the table so here are the standings up to Sunday.

The big winner of the weekend was Club Havana who, on recent form, threatens to run away with the title. The selection of Hamilton Academical to win at Celtic at 11.2 was the big play for him, and after 70 bets he is +28.19 points with an ROI of 40.86%.

Former second placed Fairfranco made another 4.44 points, but dropped a place because Trend to end made 8.66 points. Fairfranco will make another 0.91 points tonight if Brest win, but it won't be enough for second place.

The four Bundeslayga selections came up with three more winners, and with two non-winning Home Favourites in the 1.3x range, made for another profitable weekend.

Football Investor climbed the most places (14) into sixth place with 8 winners from 9 selections and 10.83 point gain.

The Duke brothers had different fortunes, with Randolph +5.02 falling one place to 4th, while Mortimer dropped 13.45 points and fell fifteen places and into the red.

Betcast also fell into the red, losing 7.28 points, as did Over Goalify who split his two over selections for the weekend, and the short-prices meant an overall loss, and TFA Euro Draws who lost 2 points.

The XX Draws almost dropped into the red. Illustrating how fickle backing the draw can be, these had 6 winners from 12 last week, followed this week by six selections and not a single winner, yet every game was Under which at least meant the XX Unders did well for the second week in a row.

Here are the entries up by ten points or more, and apologies to Draw Picks who misses the cut by 0.01 points!

Draw Picks, Drawmaster, and TFA Draws all made profits this weekend, and the five Draw Entries overall are up 13.06 points on the season from 221 bets. Here are the profitable entries from 0.01 to 9.99:

Skeeve is sitting on zero still, and in the red zone, but not by too much, we have:

Down by more than ten points, we have:

The final two actually made a profit this weekend, and overall the combined entries are up by more than a 3% ROI - a toal of 62.78 points. @ValueBankFooty's four-fold accumulator went down without a single winner, but he found a few Away wins.

No top league games next weekend, but still some opportunities in the lower leagues. As always, let me know if I appear to have messed up anyone's numbers.

October Strategy

The last couple of nights / mornings have been good for those opposing the favourites in the MLB playoffs, and I am indebted to Fizzer555 for pointing me in the direction of some historical stats to validate my thoughts posted this week.

The recency effect is well known in betting, but I have written before that in baseball, the shortest of favourites in baseball is priced longer than you would find in other major sports, because on any day, any one team can beat another.

As mentioned in this excellent article on playoff baseball by Jeff Fogle:

Many in the field of analytics emphasize the role of randomness in the baseball post-season, emphasizing that “anything can happen in a small sample size” and “the best team usually doesn’t win the pennant.”

The best team certainly doesn't. The best team (the one with most wins anyway) this year in the National League was the Washington Nationals. They trail 0-2 in a best-of-series and now travel to San Francisco needing to win both games there to stay alive.

The best (most wins) team in the American League was the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim - they are now in Kansas City trailing 0-2, fighting for their lives, and 'dogs in today's game.

So understanding that sample sizes are small, how has backing the underdog in recent seasons performed as a system?

Underdogs can be home teams or away (road) teams of course, as there are no games at neutral venues in the MLB, and there are more road 'dogs than home 'dogs. Going back to the 2011 season, the numbers for all 'dogs are:

While a couple of years have shown losses overall, both were small, and backing home 'dogs has been a winning strategy in all three years. Fizzer went back even further than me, and found over 10 years an ROI on all 'dogs of 4.8%, with home 'dogs at 13.2%. Since 2011, the numbers show each game is essentially a coin-flip.

Its simplicity reminds me of the Bundeslayga system, but whereas that system takes advantage of favourites driven too low in a league where strange things happen, and have happened over many seasons, the MLB Playoff 'dog system takes advantage of favourites driven too low, perhaps by less savvy bettors anxious to enjoy the drama of the play-offs with a financial interest.

Thanks again to Fizzer Tony for his much appreciated input.

Update: The screenshot includes the two results from last night. Hot favourites Washington Nationals were ~1.5 pre-game, traded at 1.01 with a one run lead, and lost to the road 'dogs San Francisco Giants in a marathon game of 18 innings - the longest playoff game in MLB history by time, and tied by number of innings, and MLB has a long history.

In the other game, the Los Angeles Dodgers were pre-game favourites at ~1.61, traded at 1.07 with a two run lead, gave up the two runs in the top of the 8th, but the underdog St Louis Cardinals were finished off with a home run in the bottom of the 8th. No underdog winner on this occasion, but close with the Dodgers trading as high as 2.0 in that 8th inning.

Best - Keep Your Angel Money, Royal Shark At Work

The FTL crowd wasn't that wise last week, at least not so far as the EPL was concerned. A loss of 5.65 points from the nine selections reduced the overall profit to 9.25 points.

This week sees more interest than usual in this league, with a total of 57 selections, and the top selection is a draw between Hull City and Crystal Palace. Five people have this, and four have the draw at Sunderland v Stoke City. For what it's worth, which is not very much, these two clubs did play this fixture in the League Cup less than two weeks ago, with Stoke coming from behind to win 2:1. The full predictions for this weekend are:

Other FTL highlights are that pretty much everyone is active this week. Skeeve is still waiting on the touchline, while Daily 25 has been too busy having babies which seems like a reasonable excuse for no entry. Other than those two, everyone is in, including Over Goalify who defends his 100% record with a second Overs pick in the Ajax v Zwolle game on Sunday. His first selection was a winner after 21 minutes last night and ended with a total of seven goals scored. 

For those living in fear of a big accumulator win, this weekend's entry is a four-fold (all Homes) from @ValueBankFooty comprised of:

DERBY - ROCHDALE - COVENTRY - STEVENAGE

Leader Club Havana's selections are (and I do hope these are not top secret):

Bristol City
MK Dons
Hamilton
Crystal Palace
Chesterfield Draw
St Mirren
Norwich
Bury

He is a man of few words, but you can't argue with his strategy of pretending there is no opposition!

Pete (In Play Trader) left a comment, saying:

Hey Mr Cassini

I've started blogging again, any chance of adding me to the roll

 The name of your blog would be helpful Pete, and it's Signor Cassini!

One blog that was formerly on my roll, but was removed when the crap being spouted meant a previously decent blog had finally jumped the shark, was that of the Sultan, one minute struggling to make a few thousand a month as a full-timer, the next apparently set for life (albeit in rented accommodation). Curiosity got the better of me, and I see a couple of posts ago that despite being set for life, he's still touting his Trading Guide in every post, and has this to say about Blackburn Rovers' Leon Best, who:

comes from the same place as me and was actually taught in school by my uncle! Wonder if there's any chance of him investing another £100,000 in me............

Anyone spot the inconsistency here?

And what's this about 'another'?  I'll assume that it's poor English, rather than the fact that Leon has already previously 'invested' £100,000 in him...

Somehow the sales pitches and the wistful wish for more 'investment' doesn't quite mesh with the self proclamation that the money is just rolling in these days.

I've lived on the edge for a few years now and have come through it but things can change. I think more and more about what I'm going to do with the money I've accumulated and how I'm going to invest it in future.

Here's an idea - invest it in yourself!

Fizzer555 left me an email on my baseball observations, and has some good strategies himself. I won't mention everything in case it is a closely guarded secret, but I will share this observation:

As you said, good to have some liquidity in the baseball games for a change. With the increased turnover there also comes an increased favourite bias. Backing all play-off 'dogs over the last 10 years would have given you a 4.8% ROI.

I mentioned Game 1 of the Los Angeles Angels v Kansas City Royals game last night, and perhaps some of you made some good money on last night's game which followed the same pattern. You can't say you weren't told! Once again the Angels were big favourites and the bias continued into extra innings.

As happened in Game 1, Game 2 saw the Royals win the game in extra (11) innings after the Angels again never led the game, yet traded as low as 1.2. Who was it who said: "Those who cannot learn from history are doomed to repeat it"? Probably Winston Churchill or Oscar Wilde - they said a lot of things!

There was a 1.01 gubbing in the other Los Angeles game where a 6:1 lead for the hot favourite Dodgers turned into a 6:10 deficit versus the St Louis Cardinals who scored 8 runs in the 7th inning, and held on to win 10:9.

It's Not The Winning Or Losing That Matters

I mentioned yesterday how it seemed we have had new FTL leaders after every round, and I wasn't far wrong. BettingTools.co.uk did actually hold onto the lead for a few rounds, but we have had no less than seven different leaders to date. The others are Faifranco, Drawmaster, Mortimer, Randolph, Jamie A and Club Havana, and all are still in profit although BetiingTools.co.uk 19.16 points has dwindled to less than one.

Another interesting observation is that the number of entries in profit has steadily increased. Just two were in the green early on, but by early September the number was up to 11 and now stands at 20 with two still to open their accounts, although one does have a long-awaited entry this weekend. Over Goalify is going for, you guessed it, Overs, in the Vitesse vs Ado Den Haag Eredivisie match tonight. We wish him luck on his debut.

Nicholas dropped me a suggestion as to why this season is behaving somewhat unusually so far, in regard to home advantage:

I notice your comments on the blog re Prem this season. Do you think this vanishing spray is affecting things ?

My first thought was that Nick was joking, but when you think about it, this may well have been an area where sub-consciously, referees let the home team get away with slightly more than the away side, an advantage that has now been nullified, but I think any such effect would be miniscule at best, and doesn't explain the results we are seeing.

With another International Break for the top leagues next week, I might actually have time to write a post about something other than the FTL. I've been meaning to share a post from a while back on the Betfair Forum, where a Shapeshifter had this to say about stats and ratings, and we are of the same opinion:

I've often said that in betting, the only people that profit from stats are the bookmakers.

Perhaps a simple view but on the surface, the past is not the best way to predict the future.
I've always taken the view that the 'context' of the stat is most important.

The light bulb for me came in horse racing when I started developing my own ratings. How quickly it becomes apparent that a horse who finished 6th can run faster than a horse that finished 2nd in another race. Even without ratings, looking at the lengths behind the winner can carry greater weight than how a horse "places", a number assigned to when it crossed the line, not how it crossed the line.

But you listen to pundits who will say a horse has placed on its last three outings, the papers and bookies also taking that stance.

Another example is tennis stats. I spent two year developing a rating that is given to a player’s performance. Again, the numbers build pictures on a player’s ability rather than their win/loss percentage.

Often, I will have a player go 3-1 in a tournament losing in the final. It becomes the name that everyone remembers. Meanwhile, another player went 1-1 against two better opponents and, in my book, gained some points in defeat and close to the player who went on. From there, it is a matter of weighing out the value against the rankings.

Tennis will hit you with a flurry of stats. But when you watch a match, again, the context then defines the weight you put on it rather than generalizing it. Break Point stats say more about a player able to defend than a player able to attack their opponent. And a solid serve percentage means less when it is over two sets. The number of players, especially ranked in the mid-Top 100 whose service percentage drops rapidly in the third set are there. Thus when against a player who pushes the points even over two sets will often falter during the crunch of a second set.

The bookmakers greatest tease for a punter is the past encounters. 3-1 will say the stat and 1.60 if you back him. But when one of those wins was in 2009 on a different surface than the match at hand, a line goes through it.

Then when you see that when they last met, the losing player was in the middle of a slump, losses flanked on both sides, again, the weight of that victory is questioned.

And in football, the 'form' stat is outdated. With International, Cup and FA rounds in between, the 'last six matches' is, again, a bookies dream. Then, obviously, who were these teams they played? A big difference between Man City and Fulham.

Scraping away at headline stats can often find value. Similar to a 'diamond in the rough'

My latest coup is looking how teams perform IN DEFEAT rather than in victory. On the weekend, Crystal Palace were expected to lose to Arsenal. But value on backing Arsenal wasn't there. The angle: Looking at the 'defeats', Crystal Palace still manage to play strongly in the first 45 minutes, their opponents needing to regroup at half-time to beat them. Thus DRAW/ARSENAL the play at 7/2.

For U.S. sports, the stats on baseball are presented in such a way that the lights will never go out in Vegas or New Jersey.

Two seasons ago, I started looking at how teams did over certain intervals of a nine inning game. It took a few twists and turns but eventually I found a strong window to rate a team’s performance and it has nothing to do with the result but a period within the game.

When I put my 'ratings' against 'the standings', the differences were there and an edge was created.

Bookies will put up 'Runs Per Game'. No one puts up 'Runs per 9 innings'. The extra innings in baseball are thrown into the stats. There are no ties in baseball. But, for me, if I am going to back a team, I want them to win in nine innings so that is the performance I look at, discounting the hits, the runs, the pitching during any extra period.

Last year, I built a picture on an NFL game (I believe it was Lions v Vikings). Every way I approached it, the Vikings came out on top. What the headlines said was that out of 11 visits to Detroit, the Vikings had only won twice. The odds and line went that way. I wagered on both and won.

A friend of mine who bets extensively on NFL created his own 'scoring' for matches. A simple system that defines points for a type of score. Examples, a field-goal merits one point. A touchdown merits 3 to 5. He also has a stat where each completed pass represents 'X' amount of yards. No minimum or maximum ("one 70 yard pass/run with two 25 yard passes can totally skew the stats"). That was when we were in university together. It is a bit more extensive now but still sticks to its roots.

I realize I've stated the obvious and, yes, stats are part of one’s research. But it is a matter of avoiding what I call 'the noise' and hype that stats can bring to an event.

Any views are, of course, welcome.

He later added these words:

My wording did come across as contradictory. But the main gist of it is that the public rely on the most basic of stats that are presented to them, usually by the bookmakers themselves. The extreme is to create algorithms and extensive filters to 'predict the likeliest outcome'. Around five years ago, with the help of a friend who (a) loves sports and (b) loves numbers even more, took the pythagorean theory as it is used in sports and took it further. It works great for baseball but no other sports, perhaps because of the number of games per season. I also created a set of basic filters that takes different weights on stats from football (soccer). I then tried it live and though the returns on 1x2 were okay, it did create a filter that triggered around eight matches a week from fifteen leagues world-wide of odds against OU 2.5. So where I may not believe in stats, I do believe in taking a different angle on all sports than research that is readily available and, as stated, placed like giant billboards in front of the betting public and repeated in a Clockwork Orange rehabilitation approach on in-play radio.

Readers of this blog will know that my opinion of League Tables for betting is that they are useless, and should be aware that for the Elo based ratings, the result is incidental. It's not unusual for a team to gain Elo points in a defeat, or lose Elo points after a win. I'm not a tennis bettor, but Shapeshifter mentions baseball, and with the play-offs underway, it might be a good time to remind you of the strategy I disclosed last year of opposing the pre-match favourite later in matches. As fizzer555 commented at the time:

Cassini may be on to something though as by the time you get to the 7th innings the main reason for the fav/dog bias may be out of the game (i.e. the SPs) but I think the market may retain some fav/dog bias (gradually reducing across the 9 innings) that may not be justified. Don't have data to prove that but over 2 or 3 innings the hitting strength of each team is going to be very similar except for a few outliers (e.g. Miami, Houston low hitting) and similarly with bullpen pitching a lot of the teams will be in a narrow performance range.

The recently ended game between the favourites (1.55) Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim and the Kansas City Royals (enjoying play-off baseball for the first time since 1985 incidentally), the Angels never led bet traded as low as 1.3 before losing in extra innings. The reason, as I mentioned last year, that the Angels were big favourites was due to the SP (starting pitcher) Jered Weaver being a bit of a star, but once he was out of the game, that advantage was gone, yet the markets consistently fail to correct as fast as they should when the SP is done. Yes, sometimes the bull-pen might still be stronger for the pre-game favourites, but when it gets to the play-offs, every team has earned its place there (over a 162 game season) and no team is shabby. The other advantage of play-offs is that there is a little in-play liquidity. On the few occasions I looked in on regular season games, there was very little action.  

First Prize

The first cash prize winner of the 2014-15 FTL season has been determined, and the winner of the August / September £25 monthly prize is:

Perfect timing to take the lead, and an impressive opening few weeks from Club Havana with the best ROI from any entry with more than 30 selections.

The other 19 in profit selections are:

I've not been tracking it, but it does seem that we have had new leaders after almost every round. After the midweek results, the total profit and ROI are:

The October monthly prize will be for this weekend up to the midweek of Tuesday 28th.

Cup Luck

First, the Erskine Cup standings after the first round of group games:

Football Elite saw off the dustbins as Stoke City won last night, a result that also helped Online Trader pick up three points. The luckiest winner of the weekend ties was Daily 25 who lost 3.51 points but beat Jamie A who lost another 2 points when Stoke City v Newcastle United stayed under and Udinese beat Parma.

The unluckiest loser was the Cassini Value Selections which made 3.09 points, but lost to new league leader Randolph who already has dreams of doing the double.

Biggest margin of victory was Abromo over BettingTools.co.uk (13.88) and the smallest win was Mountain Mouse's 0.46 over Gecko.

As for the league, the big winner of the weekend was XX Draws with 6 winners from 12 selections and 8.55 points followed by Club Havana who had 7 winners from 8 selections for 8.02 points. Randolph's 4.69 points took him up six places to the top of the table, while XX Draws moved up 14 places, Club Havana up 10 places into second, and XX Unders up 6 places. Only 11 of 33 are in the red and overall, the profit is 39.62 points.

The top, profitable, 20 entries are:

Once again, the Selections total doesn't match the W-L-V totals in some cases as there are a few midweek selections, and in one case because I need to add in a couple of losers! The August / September monthly prize is up for grabs, with Club Havana just half a point behind Randolph with four selections tonight:

Birmingham City (@ Millwall), Derby County (v AFC Bournemouth), Wigan Athletic (v Nottingham Forest) and Cardiff City (@ Brighton and Hove Albion).

The first three matches are definitely from the Championship, but I'm not sure if Brighton are still there or not. Mind The Gap :) 

At the bottom of the table, those letting the side down are:

Dustbins 2:1 Up

Erskine Cup Round Up

There are a few issues still to be resolved, but here are some updates on the FTL, with the focus on the Erskine Cup to mix things up a little.

Group A

Mortimer had only to finish in profit to take the 3 points versus no-show @ValueBankFooty, but had a poor weekend dropping 6.75 points so a walkunder victory for @ValueBankFooty.

Sjosta failed to show up, but Ian Erskine struggled and lost 3.46 points so Sjosta picks up the second walkunder win of the weekend. Ian does have one selection tonight, but even if it wins, it won’t be enough to win the tie.

Group B

Talkies Tips made a profit of 0.87 points and all three elections were all done by Saturday, but Trend to end had a total of 19 selections with two still to come. Trend to end is currently down 1.86 points and thus needs both Palermo and Parma to win to overtake Talkie.

Thinking that all he needed to do was beat a team of dustbins, XX Draws was quietly relaxing on Saturday when a sweating Football Investor showed up red-faced and panting and without shame handed in his team-sheet.

Excuses were plentiful, including the car breaking down, the dog eating his entry form, and his grandmother's abduction by aliens, but in the spirit of good sportsmanship, XX Draws agreed to play the game.

Football Investor came up with a 1.02 point profit by the end of Saturday, but one of the best weekends in XX Draws history (+9.55 points) meant this tie wasn’t much of a contest.

Group C

Fulltimebettingblog lost 3.78 points on Saturday, and Online Trader is currently down 3.00 with one selection to come. A Stoke City win tonight and Online Trader takes the points, anything else and the joint early lead in the group goes to Fulltimebettingblog.

OverGoalify was another no-show, and Football Elite needed a profit of any size. Two losses on the Recommended Bets and one win from three for the Vulnerable Home Favourites system means that this tie will also be decided tonight. Due to contractual obligations, I am unable to tell you which team Football Elite are on though.

Group D

Betting Tools had a nightmare of a weekend losing nine of the first ten and even a win for Newcastle United tonight won’t be enough to catch Abromo who is currently up by 3.18 points with lays of Panthrakikos and Parma tonight.

Skeeve was the final no-show this weekend, meaning XX Unders needed a profit this weekend, and they duly obliged with 10 of 11 selections going Under 2.5, with one more game in play tonight. Currently up 7.32 points, and that one loser was another 90th minute goal I might add.

Group E

Draw Picks has one more game tonight, Udinese v Parma, but even if that match is a draw, it won’t be enough to catch TFA_Raz who is in the clubhouse with 1.79 points. Draw Picks had one winner from five so far.

In the much anticipated ‘Battle of the Draws’, Peter Nordsted’s Drawmaster lost all three which meant that TFA Graeme’s two Euro selections on Sunday were guaranteed to win the tie even if both lost. He had a winner, Nantes v Lyon, to actually earn the points.

Group F

Randolph and Cassini Value was the tie of the weekend in terms of points gained, 7.78 between them, but Everton’s 90th minute equalizer at Liverpool tipped the balance in favour of Randolph. That’s the Cup for you!

Club Havana had no trouble getting the better of the TFA Draws whose three domestic selections all lost. Club Havana has the third highest profit of the weekend (6.89) and will add to that if Stoke City win.

Group G

Fairfranco v Rubicon is in the books, and both lost points. Fairfranco lost fewer though, so he takes the 3 points.

The closest tie of the weekend was Gecko v Mountain Mouse, decided in favour of the latter by just 0.46 points 2.68 to 2.22.

Group H

The Bundeslayga system had just one selection, a loser, so this was an easy win for Betcast who made 3.87 points.

Jamie A is currently down 2.00 points and will pick up the win if either Stoke City v Newcastle United goes Over 2.5 goals or if Udinese draw with Parma. Daily 25 has a final total of -3.51 points.

The one group that is set after the weekend is Group G, with Mountain Mouse and Fairfranco on top.

Thanks again to Ian Erskine for sponsoring this sideshow, and the second round of Group matches will be on the weekend of Saturday, November 1st, ie Friday, 31st October thru Monday, 3rd November. 

As I use the Tuesday or Saturday date to determine which month the round falls into, this round will be the first for November's monthly prize.   

I’ll publish the full table once the Monday results are in, but above are the entries in profit to date. No less than 20 of 33 in profit, which is a lot more than I was expecting by this stage of the season. Not that the W-L-V totals are out of sync with the Selection total where entries have selections tonight.

With the end of September falling on Tuesday, the Monthly Prize for August / September will also include the handful of games on Wednesday (and any on Thursday) should anyone have any selections that day.

Grøn All Over tak du

I occasionally take a look at where the hits on this blog are originating, and noticed a number today from a www.betxpert.com forum in Danish. Now Danish isn't one of my best languages, but the 'superstar', 'post' and 'blog' caught my attention. Mostly the 'superstar' to be honest.

Jeg følger allerede med i Cassinis blog og mener faktisk også det var dig der henviste til den i en anden tråd. Og er enig med dig i at Cassinis blog er særdeles fremragende.

Her er en anden post af superstar Cassini. Hans blog er det tætteste man kommer på guld efter min mening.

Her kigger han på hvordan hjemmebanefordelen er aftaget gennem årene - i nogle rækker.

Translation - per Google:

I already complies with the Cassini blog and think actually it was you who referred to it in another thread. And agree with you in that Cassini's blog is very excellent.

Here 's another post of superstar Cassini . His blog is the closest thing to gold in my opinion.

Here he looks at how the home advantage has diminished over the years - in some rows.

Made my day - excellent, superstar, gold... :)

Thanks whoever wrote those words, and yes, the decline in Home advantage is continuing this season. Early days, but the EPL Home Win percentage is currently very low at 31%, (10 year average 46.95%). Draws are the most frequent result to date, followed by Away wins, which is quite remarkable.

In the Bundesliga the current 40% is the lowest for at least 10 years (10-yr avg 45.23%), but they are the most frequent result, tied with the Draw. Aways are under-performing here.

In Italy, Spain and France, the Home Win remains the most frequent result, but Italy's 38% is also the lowest in at least 10 years, as is the 43% in Spain.

Only in France is the Home Win percentage holding up at previous levels, currently hitting at 47%.

It's a little early to draw any conclusions, but something to keep an eye on.

Finding Value

Some of you may have read the comment on the last post from Stewboss (Football Investor) regarding his failure to show up for this weekend's Cup match. His entry finally arrived some 12 hours after the official deadline, and while in future I need to disallow any late entries to keep it fair to everyone, I made an exception this time because 1) Stewboss would have send out his selections to subscribers before my deadline, and 2) his opponent in the opening Erskine Cup match was me.

Had it been anyone else, it would have been somewhat unfair to tell them that they only needed to finish in the green to win three points, and then change that, but as I was aware before 3pm that the selections were there, it's not a big deal. In the end, it looks like Football Investor will make a profit, but only around a point or so, and the XX Draws were already ahead after Friday night, and continued their good weekend with two perfect draws from two selections today (Freiburg v Bayer Leverkusen and Sunderland v Swansea City). I'm looking good although with several selections still to come tomorrow, nothing is yet guaranteed.

While the Cassini Value Selections have started the season poorly, although this weekend has seen a change in fortune despite Everton's 90th minute equaliser which was more than a little annoying, it was nice to receive a comment from one member who wrote last week:

Again thanks for your hard work and insight into footie betting. This few weeks has changed my view of betting on football and I have started to keep my own stats. I am now looking for the value - which matched Newcastle, Man C and Liverpool.

I know it's a topic that Ian Erskine and I both agree on, but it's worth mentioning again that while the selections themselves are obviously important, the discipline required is just as important. I mentioned above that Everton's 90th minute equaliser was 'annoying', but it's a silly word to use.

To get upset about an individual loss makes as much sense as a casino owner crying over a large payout from one of his slot machines.

If you have an edge, of course. It's a lot easier to handle losses and stay the course if the money doesn't matter (stake sensibly in other words) and if you have confidence in the long term edge of your selections. Value doesn't mean every bet will win - far from it, and in the short term there will be losing runs.

I think Steve M (Daily 25) may be confused about this idea of having value in your selections. Here is one of his selections from today's schedule:

As I said earlier, value doesn't always win.

Finally, on a personal note, I'm struggling to understand my son's decision this weekend to forsake the cosy confines of Selhurst Park and the array of talent in red and blue, for an overseas trip to see another team in those famous colours - one who play at the Nou Camp and feature relative unknowns such as Messi and Neymar. An odd decision in my view.  

Erskine Cup And Walkunders

The midweek matches did see a few changes to the table, with Jamie A the big winner moving to the top on the back of an 11.26 point gain. I was going to merge the midweek results in with this weekend, but I'd hate to deny Jamie A his place atop the podium, so here are the top 10 as we head into the weekend:

There are a few entries not showing up the first match of the Erskine Cup (I don't recall this happening in the FIFA World Cup) so the match-ups, with some notes to enhance your Cup experience, are:

While in football, a team whose opponents fail to show up is awarded a walkover and 3 points, I have the novel idea of adding in the possibility of a walkunder. Basically Mortimer, Ian Erskine, XX Draws, Football Elite and XX Unders are facing a team of dustbins, with the embarrassing possibility of losing to them! It's rather upsetting that two people think they can beat my XX Selections without showing up, but if last night's results continue through the weekend, and that is a big if, they may regret that decision. One goal in the two selections so far, and that was a 90th minute effort.

That every tie has at least one selection, means the chances of a draw are rather slim, so it's 3 points or nothing.

Ian Erskine, to whom we all owe a large debt of gratitude for sponsoring this diversion to the regular season, also had two selections last night, but has dug a small hole for himself as both Mainz '05 and Elche failed to win at home. Football Elite also handed the advantage to an idle opponent, as he had Mainz '05 to win as well.

Joining XX Draws with Mainz '05 v Hoffenheim as a draw selection was Draw Picks so TFA_Raz is already behind, as is Rubicon whose opponent Fairfranco found a draw in Ligue 2 although offset by one losing selection.

In Group E, there's a battle of the Draws, with Peter Nordsted's Drawmaster pitting three selections against TFA Graeme's first two selections of the season.

With three Group games, no one will be eliminated after this weekend, and the randomness of it all hopefully adds a little fun to the FTL. Thanks again Ian for making this possible.

And now for the Wisdom of the FTL Crowd forecast. Last week was another profit, which for the season now stands at 14.9 points.

Four homes and four draws with one No Bet where the panel is evenly divided.

Trendy Mistake

The good news is that I didn't mess up Jamie A's numbers at the weekend. The bad news is that is was the turn of Trend to end to fall victim of my updating skills, recording Granada's win at Athletic Bilbao as a win, but not crediting him for it with points. The 7.69 made quite a difference, propelling Trend to end into second place, so there is an update to the table and an update to the Erskine Cup groups.

The revised Erskine Cup groups are now:

which interestingly pits three Draw selectors in the one Group (E). Apologies to Talkies Tips, Online Trader, Abromo, TFA_Raz, myself and Rubicon for the late change in travel plans.

Erskine Cup Opening Matches

With a short turnaround between the weekend matches which finished last night, and the midweek matches which start tonight, there's not too much time for a detailed write up of the FTL results, but the table and a few highlights are here. One unforeseen circumstance came up this weekend, when for some reason there are no Pinnacle Sports prices recorded for the Queens Park Rangers v Stoke City game. It wasn't a hugely popular fixture, and I went with the average prices per Football Data.

First, the entries in profit, and there are a lot of them with the overall total up by a combined 35.03 points, which is quite impressive.

Mortimer has quietly moved up the table, (up 8.41 at the weekend) and now leads after BettingTools.co.uk dropped a couple of places. Draw Picks is having a great start, and made another 5.88 with five winning draws from 11 selections. Fairfranco slipped three places, but Trend to end was the big mover of the week, up by 21 places which may be a record. His big winner was Crystal Palace (9.52) to win at Everton, so entering that win was a delight. Bundeslayga made a small profit, Jamie A made a bigger one (3.85) and Club Havana had his best week (5.49) and is on a good run. Drawmaster made 2.48 with four draws from 11, the XX Unders had seven winners from 11, and Football Elite made 2.96 to move into profit thanks to Mainz '05 and Leicester City. Football Investor was economical, one bet, one win, and Sjosta made a small loss. Ian Erskine tried to break the rules by having more than one selection in the same game, but I caught him. If someone does this, e.g Augsburg v Werder Bremen Draw followed by Lay Augsburg, I take the first bet and discard the second, so Ian actually benefited by this rule! Paul Watson tried the same trick too, but fortunately for me, I'm not as stupid as I look (a great relief to my mother).

As for the losers, here they are:

Bounty Boy TFA's Draws got hot with two winners from four to move up the table, and there's not really any highlights at the bottom. @ValueBankFooty lost his five-fold acca and it wasn't even close with two winners and three losers. The unlucky 33rd placed Paul Watson is eliminated from the Erskine Cup, for which next weekend represents the opening Group matches. I say unlucky, but in the end, it wasn't even close.

The Groups are thus set for the Erskine Cup, and the Groups and match ups are below. The format should be fairly obvious, so without further ado, here are the Groups A to H and next weekend's ties:

OverGoalify, Skeeve and TFA Euro Draws have yet to make a bet, but can still take 3 points if their opponent makes a loss. Or they may be in action this weekend. Who knows? The drama of a cup weekend has already begun.

TFA_Raz is in the same group as mentor TFA and his Euro Draws, who open their campaign against another Draw seeker Drawmaster. Oh the delicious irony should this match end in a draw!

I wish everyone the best of luck this weekend, except Football Investor, Skeeve, Fairfranco and Betcast.

Wiser By The Week

The FTL crowd is gaining wisdom as the season progresses. Each week, the result of following the crowd has improved.

Not a very impressive win-loss ratio, but when the relatively few winners include Stoke City at Manchester City and Aston Villa at Liverpool, it doesn't need to be.

Here are this weekend's consensus picks:

A definite away bias this week, and with Aways hitting at 35% so far this season, that's reasonable and incidentally, not unexpected:

But averages can be deceiving. In the days of Division One, Away teams won 24% of matches. Since the Premier League was formed, they have won 27%, and have steadily chipped away at the long established home advantage.

The last three seasons have seen an average Away win percentage of 30.3%. This is actually quite remarkable because it is a number not seen in a single season since 1947. Away teams over this three year period have averaged 1.22 goals per game, a number not seen since England won the World Cup.

Here are the win percentages over time – notice how the Away win averages are steadily gaining over the years, and in the last three seasons in particular:

For the acca watchers out there, @ValueBankFooty is back with a five-fold Home Accumulator:

PRESTON - CAMBRIDGE - CHELTENHAM - TOTTENHAM - PLYMOUTH

Confident, If Not Entirely Convinced

Some changes at the top after Wednesday's results, and nice to see Mortimer and Randolph side by side! Here are the in-profit entries to date:

Scott has pointed me to an article on a 'responsible gambler' who can afford to lose £900k on the Scottish Referendum. I'm also not sure a 'responsible' person would be walking around the streets of south-west London with hundreds of thousands of pounds in their trousers, and betting it at a high street bookmaker, but maybe I'm just being difficult. There are other ways to play this bet:

A political punter stands to gain just over £1million if Scotland votes No to independence after placing a £900,000 bet at his local bookmaker, William Hill.

The middle-aged businessman, who is not Scottish, has gambled the biggest amount of money ever staked on a political event on Scotland staying in the United Kingdom.

After already placing £600,000 on the outcome of the referendum the customer has now added a further £200,000 to his wager, and stands to collect £1,093,333.33 should the outcome of the poll be a No vote.

“He placed the first part of his bet, £400,000, in June 2014, then returned to the same betting shop on two different dates in August to stake a further £200,000 each time,” said William Hill's spokesman Graham Sharpe.

“Now, today - Tuesday - he has come back in and placed an additional £100,000 on the same outcome,” said. “This adds up to the biggest bet of the century on any subject with us - and almost certainly with any bookmaker,” Mr Sharp added.

The customer took odds of 1/ 4 for the first part of his bet; 1/6 for the second part; 1/5 for the third, and now 1/5 again - meaning his actual profit would be £193,333.33.

“This man is confident, if not entirely convinced, that his gamble will pay off - in fact, he has called it an ‘investment’ said Mr Sharpe. “He isn't yet sure how or where he will discover the outcome of the Referendum.”

Mr Sharpe added: "All three bets have been placed in the same branch of William Hill in south-west London.

He said the customer was a “responsible gambler” and gave every indication he could afford to lose the money if the result did not go his way.

“He sees losing the money more as an intellectual blow than a financial blow. But he is confident and says he has done his homework.”

The latest William Hill Scottish referendum odds are 2/11 NO; 19/5 YES.

If Scotland leave, do Berwick Rangers have to join the English National League system, and if so, where do they start?

European Delay

It's quite remarkable that there are no less than four matches this week between EPL teams and Bundesliga teams. Borussia Dortmund beat Arsenal 2:0 last night, and this evening we have Chelsea v Schalke '04 and Bayern Munich v Manchester City - not sure when United play...


Tomorrow night, the Europa League sees Everton host Wolfsburg. With matches between Fiorentina and Guingamp plus Borussia Moenchengladbach and Villareal, it means that the ratings won't be updated until late Thursday or Friday morning, so for Cassini Service subscribers the newsletter will be a little later than usual.

A quick look at the big winners and losers from the midweek matches to date in the FTL. Mortimer is top dog, up 18 places into fourth on the back of a 7.56 point gain, with another 0.72 to add if Derby County can win at Blackburn Rovers tonight.

Paul Watson (-7.74) and TFA_Raz (-4.44) were the biggest losers so far this midweek. Paul's loss could be particularly catastrophic as @ValueBankFooty managed a profit (+2.77) even if his accumulator went down, and moved out of last place into an Erskine Cup spot. Paul needs a Fulham win (at Notts County) tonight and a decent return this weekend (or a dramatic loss from elsewhere of course).

A couple of entries are looking for the draw at Blackburn, and Fairfranco wants one at the Fleetwood Town v Barnsley game. Randolph wants a Fleetwood Town win, but even if they don't, it's been a good midweek for the Duke brothers currently 4th and 7th and looking at £445.

Marty left a comment asking:

A quick rules question: 25ish bets - would be feasible for 25 accas? Or should we treat as 25 selections (whether accas or singles)?

This could get tricky. With the exception of @ValueBankFooty, there has been no interest in accumulators, not even doubles or trebles, so it would be a shock to receive 25 10-folds this weekend, but then I have been shocked before. For now I'll say that one accumulator counts as one bet of the '25-ish' bets allowed.

Actually, one entry did have 30 selections this midweek, but all bets were backs and all a lot easier to manage, and in the '25-ish' range. Accas are easy to settle, in that when settling them, I simply stop at a loser.

It just occurred to me that having an "ish" rule is probably not a good idea. As I am in the competition myself, it may well be in my interest that others fare poorly, so it is clearly not good to be in a position where I can choose to accept or decline entries after matches have been played.

So the rule is that up to 25 bets is definitely acceptable, and slightly over that number is probably acceptable. The 25 rule will only be enforced if I reply to your selection email to this effect.

Thanks to Pedro who sent me a spreadsheet of team names for more than 40 leagues as used by Betexplorer and Oddsportal, and while I am not sure how much I can utilise it, the thought and effort is appreciated.

Rubicon took a break from working out how to get back into profit by sending me a link to an article about Betfair (Sportsbook) paying out early on a No vote in the Scotland Independence Referendum which of course isn't until tomorrow.

Betfair is so confident of a "No" vote in Thursday's Scottish independence referendum that it is already paying out to those who have staked money on it.

The online bookmaker says it is paying out a "six-figure sum".

Despite polls ahead of the vote continuing to be close, betting markets have been overwhelmingly in favour of the Better Together camp winning on Thursday.

Betfair said this morning that gambling patterns indicate a 79pc likelihood of a "No" vote.

Despite the odds on "Yes" shortening last week, they have lengthened significantly in the last few days.

Financial markets have appeared to mirror betting patterns in recent days, with both suggesting that the chances of a "Yes" vote are far slimmer than polls suggest.

Betfair's pay-out applies to its sportsbook operation, not the online exchange in which punters bet against each other.

Odds on a "Yes" vote have drifted from 4 (or 3/1) at the end of last week to 4.5 (or 7/2) on the exchange.

This would mean a £100 bet would return £450 if Scotland votes for independence. Backing "No" would return £127.

“Political bettors have often favoured the exchange as their choice of betting platform and it has historically provided an accurate prediction of political outcomes," said Betfair's Naomi Totten.

"Paying out early on our Sportsbook is testament to the esteem in which we hold the illustrious track record of our Exchange.

A six figure sum. A cheap publicity stunt, and the price of a No victory is even shorter as I write this, in the 1.23 / 1.24 range. The media loves to make out such contests are close (think US Presidential Elections) but they are usually anything but, and money talks. The exchange has indeed "historically provided an accurate prediction of political outcomes", and the results of quality opinion polls shouldn't be ignored.

On this subject (quality polling, not Scotland), 538 published this article which I found interesting.

I was troubled by a survey released Monday by Mitchell Research in Michigan. It wasn’t that the results — which showed Democratic Rep. Gary Peters leading Republican Terri Lynn Land by 2 percentage points in the U.S. Senate race and Republican Gov. Rick Snyder leading Democrat Mark Schauer by 5 points in the governor’s race — were necessarily wrong. It was how Mitchell said it arrived at them that bothered me.

From the Mitchell release:

Mitchell Research had intended to release a survey today that we conducted on Wednesday, Sept. 10th, prior to President Obama’s speech to the nation regarding the conflict in the Mid-East. That poll showed Snyder leading by only 1 point, and Peters up by 8 points. However, because of changing poll data nationally, we decided to conduct a survey last night (September 14) to see if those events coupled with the increased television advertising by Snyder and Land might have changed the races in Michigan.

Here’s one way to read this: Mitchell Research conducted a poll, thought the results looked wrong and decided to conduct another survey to get results it thought made more sense.

That would be fine if Mitchell released the full data from the first poll. But it didn’t.

A pollster should release its work regardless of whether it thinks the results are right. Outliers happen even to the best pollsters. They are supposed to happen.

And, of course, a pollster has no way of knowing whether a result is an outlier.

Sometimes when a poll appears to be an outlier, it’s the first survey to pick up real movement in a race. And sometimes when a poll fits neatly into previous surveys, all the surveys end up being wrong.

Squashing results, however, suggests a pollster is looking at other pollsters’ work (beyond its weighting mechanism) to determine whether data is worthy of publication. Such decisions can lead us down a bad path.

When a pollster holds back some data, we can’t be sure what other results it might be holding back or changing. What might have happened if Mitchell Research’s second poll didn’t seem to match what it thought it should be? Would it have conducted a third poll?

What happens when there are other results Mitchell Research doesn’t like?

And though it’s beside the point, I should note that Mitchell’s explanation for the change in results has no backing from the majority of other polls. President Obama’s approval rating is the same as it was a week ago, according to the aggregate of polling information. There hasn’t been a big swing to Republicans in the majority of other Senate races. The FiveThirtyEight estimate actually gives Democrats a better shot at holding on to the Senate than they had a week ago.

But not releasing all results that were meant for public consumption is sketchy, even if it’s thought that those results might be wrong.

As readers of the Cassini Newsletter will know, my numbers are often quite out of line with the market, which could mean great value has been identified, or more likely that I am missing something. It is with some hesitation that I mention some of these, because no one wants to look stupid, but I often do.

For example, last week, I suggested that Reims at 2.97 appeared to be value versus Toulouse, with the market at 2.45, and also Bordeaux at Guingamp (3.17 / 2.45). In Germany I had Paderborn at 2.21 v Koln, with Pinnacle offering 3.21 on them.

The results? Reims won 2:0, Bordeaux lost 1:2, and Paderborn drew 0:0. On this subject, one member asked me why I don't include higher priced selections in my Cassini Value Selections. The answer is that my concern with odds being much over the 10% threshold, it's usually because I am missing something, and the prices on offer are literally too good to be true. At higher odds, i.e. lower probability of winning, a small error can mean a supposed edge is triggered more easily, and confidence in long-shots is weaker. It's something to keep an eye on though, because the pricing model (aka Excel spreadsheet) 'should' improve as more results are entered in, and longer prices may become more appealing.

If I calculate the true probability of an event as 0.125 the market need only have it at 0.114 for it to be 10% value. At evens, my estimate of a 0.5 probability only has a 10% edge if the market's is at 0.445.

Finally, and its not quite the same thing, but I'm sure most of you have noticed how certain people are very quick to announce their results after a good weekend, and yet go very quiet when it is the reverse. I suppose some people are stupid, and don't see through this, but I personally find it annoying.