Football Months (Betting School Article)

Another Betting School article. This time one I originally wrote in January 2010. It talks about the coming months in the season so should still be a good read and valuable.

Football Months

We are now in the new year and the fresh start gives us a chance to look ahead to the rest of the season. Most leagues they have passed the half way point in terms of matches but there is still plenty to come and lots to be decided. In January and February teams are still jostling for position and trying to move up the table but as the season nears the finish some games mean a lot and other games are meaningless.

The aim of this article is to look at the changes that occur over the course of a football season and see if there are any profitable angles

The data I use comes from www.football-data.co.uk and spans 5 seasons from 05-06 to 09-10 for the top leagues in Germany, England, France, Italy and Spain.

When looking at data over time charts come into their own and there is no better way to see patterns. The first areas to look at are goals scored and then shots taken as they go together.

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Looking at the above you can see some similarities and obvious patterns. At the start of the season the goals are pretty low. However, the number of shots is not lower and so it may be that players take a while to get into the groove and so the early season dip in goals is to do with a bit of rustiness. Then come the months of January and February where there is a clear drop in both the number of goals and number of shots. I can think of no explanation for the drop in shots unless poor pitches and cold weather plays a part. The final part of the season sees a clear increase in both shots and goals possibly down to a lot of teams having little to play for. This brings a more carefree attitude and teams may concede and score more goals as there is less pressure.

As we can see a pattern here the best market to exploit it might be the over under 2.5 market. If we look at percentage of matches under 2.5 goals we hope to see the same pattern again. The big question is do the bookmakers also know that this pattern exists? By charting the average price of under 2.5 goals we should be able to see just that.

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Although the under 2.5 graph is reversed you can see the same pattern exists in January and February with those 2 months having the highest averages of the season. If we look at the odds for the bookmakers (I have used BbAv<2.5 = Betbrain average under 2.5 goals) we can see a minor drop but nothing like we have seen in any of the other charts. The bookmakers have the climb at the end of the season spot on but there could be a bit of profit to be taken in the months of January and February.

The reason I chose the under market is that it is more profitable than the overs market.  You can see this in the following table as well as a complete breakdown by month for over and under 2.5 results. Again this uses the Betbrain average over and under 2.5 goals price from football-data.co.uk.

Month

Matches

% Over 2.5

Over P/L

Over ROI

% Under 2.5

Under P/L

Under ROI

Aug

627

46.6%

-44.48

-7.1%

53.4%

-42.59

-6.8%

Sep

903

45.2%

-116.22

-12.9%

54.8%

-28.25

-3.1%

Oct

938

48.0%

-71.16

-7.6%

52.0%

-72.57

-7.7%

Nov

916

47.2%

-85.82

-9.4%

52.8%

-60.13

-6.6%

Dec

971

48.4%

-49.46

-5.1%

51.6%

-86.74

-8.9%

Jan

836

42.3%

-143.62

-17.2%

57.7%

5.91

0.7%

Feb

976

44.3%

-130.25

-13.3%

55.7%

-18.01

-1.8%

Mar

1018

45.6%

-102.08

-10.0%

54.4%

-51.02

-5.0%

Apr

1088

48.1%

-60.11

-5.5%

51.9%

-90.32

-8.3%

May

827

54.8%

-5.15

-0.6%

45.2%

-111.96

-13.5%

Total

9100

47.0%

-808.35

-8.9%

53.0%

-555.68

-6.1%

What stands out to me here immediately is that backing all games under 2.5 in January returned a profit and doing the same in February just returns a very small loss. If we had used the maximum odds then those two months combined return an 80pt profit and a ROI of 4.5%.

The other point is that even though the bookies expect more goals in May you can still do well backing overs. Looking at the maximum odds a profit is attainable for this month backing every game as over 2.5 goals.

I think it’s worth digging a little deeper into the January and February under 2.5 results to see if we can find more profitable angles. Maybe some leagues may be better than others so that is a starting point.

Month

Country

Matches

% Under 2.5

Under P/L

Under ROI

Jan

Germany

61

47.5%

-3.32

-5.4%

Feb

Germany

189

48.7%

-4.59

-2.4%

Jan

England

183

57.4%

5.34

2.9%

Feb

England

170

58.2%

3.45

2.0%

Jan

France

172

69.2%

15.14

8.8%

Feb

France

192

58.9%

-14.89

-7.8%

Jan

Italy

207

53.1%

-12.21

-5.9%

Feb

Italy

225

58.2%

6.65

3.0%

Jan

Spain

213

55.9%

0.96

0.5%

Feb

Spain

200

54.5%

-8.63

-4.3%

Very interesting that the Premier League is the only league to show a profit for both months. Serie A and the Bundesliga are the only two leagues not showing a profit in January and that does look a better month to concentrate on. In February, aside from England, Italy is the only country that shows a profit. If we stick with the Premier League in January we’ll see if it’s possible to improve the figures using a rule. If we exclude any match featuring one of the big 3 of Arsenal, Chelsea and Manchester United we get these results

Month

Matches

% Under 2.5

Under P/L

Under ROI

Jan

131

61.1%

16.73

12.8%

Feb

121

59.5%

7.64

6.3%

Normally I would include Liverpool in the big 4 but with their current situation and the poor time they had last season I thought it sensible to stick with a consistent 3 and they make little difference to the results either way. So a simple system of backing under 2.5 goals for Premier League matches in January when one of the big 3 is not playing returns a very nice profit.

It makes sense to look at some other statistics now and see if patterns exist. There is data for corners and cards but sadly no data for the odds so we cannot search for profitable angles but merely speculate.

image005

January again features as the lowest month along with October. I am not sure whay October appears but the drop in January would fit with what we found earlier with less shots. I would assume less shots would contribute to a lower corner count. With corners not being a totally mainstream market there could well be opportunities going lower in January. As in all the charts we see the peak towards the end of the season.

The last area to look at is cards.

image006image007

With the yellow cards there is a clear pattern at the start and end of the season of less cards but from October to March it all looks pretty steady. Refs probably start the season trying to be more lenient or maybe firmer pitches then and at the end of the season play a part. Again I would imagine the bookies may be aware of the lower card counts at the end of the season but the drop is quite considerable and they may not judge it correctly. In terms of red cards there is a drop in November which seems a bit out of character and if we ignore that then the red cards would show a similar pattern to the yellows.

Overall it looks like there are a few distinct sections to a season and we are in the midst of one now in January and February to come. The league may not be decided in these months but the games are very important as everyone still has something to play for. We can expect less goals and less corners it seems as well. Then when we get to May we should see more patterns emerging like more shots, more goals, more corners and less cards.  Further research may be needed to see how the end of season stats are affected by teams playing for nothing or those at the top and bottom of the table.

Leon Pidgeon

Recent form to ignite FA Cup upsets this weekend

The FA Cup fourth round gets underway next weekend with 32 teams battling it out for the right to progress in football’s most historic club competition. Recently the Premier League betting news has been dominated by some biggish upsets such as Southampton drawing with Chelsea, Reading’s comeback against Newcastle and Tottenham’s 90th minute equaliser against Man United. The FA Cup is something different and draw has thrown up some enticing match-ups, with the likelihood of a Cup upset on the cards as teams enter a busy spring period in the calendar.

Of the 20 Premier League teams to enter in the third round, 13 have survived to reach the fourth – showcasing just how seriously top-flight clubs are taking this tournament. Yet these sides must be careful in this fourth round, as there are some plucky smaller teams determined to cause an upset.

Brighton fans will be optimistic their side can overturn Arsenal after defeating Newcastle for the second time in successive years to reach the fourth round. Gus Poyet’s men are on a four-game unbeaten streak averaging 2.25 goals per game in 2013. They’ve lost just once at home since mid-October and face an Arsenal side with just one win in five, prior to tonight’s re-arranged game with West Ham. These stats are certainly worth bearing in mind if you bet on football with bet365.

Norwich City may also fall victim to Blue Square Premier side Luton Town: undefeated in five and victorious over Wolves in the third round. Chris Hughton’s men, meanwhile, head into the fixture off a 5-0 defeat at Liverpool and without a Premier League win in six.

Macclesfield, who have won three of their last four, host a Wigan side with just one win in five; while Leeds, who have won their last six league games at Elland Road, face Spurs without a win in two.

Lower-league clubs, therefore, will fancy their chances against stuttering top-flight opponents and must be eyeing up a lucrative fifth-round clash off the back of it. The FA Cup is the home of upsets and teams will be hoping to use their form to their advantage and scalp one of the big boys.

23 Jan, 13 | Posted in: Promotions | Comments Closed

BTTS (Guest Article)

Jonny Grossmark offered me the chance to feature one of his articles and like a tv with a broken volume control I could not turn it down.

———————————————————————————-

Goals Galore betting has become very popular in recent years and the bookmakers have been quick to offer the general public the ability to bet on an individual game (BTTS) Both Teams to Score or in a minimum of 3 matches were the the slogan is ;

“when both teams score it is goals galore”

You can even do a lucky dip with  a fixed price for the 3 correct at 3/1 and 4 correct at 11/2 and 5 correct at 10/1 and 6 correct at 16/1 moving up to 15 correct at 1350/1 so if you simply backed 3 matches to end BTTS YES then this bookmaker would pay you £4 back with £3 being your net profit.

On line Betting tipsters who are not directly associated with the bookmakers but either charge for their “tips’ or are paid by the bookmakers to promote them are now trying to also cash in on what has become a very popular bet with the general public.

As an example i found  a free tipping site with a Betfred goals galore logo with the offer to back 4 matches at 8/1 with Betfred to all score. In the four games offered six of the teams did score and Aston Villa and Northampton were the two teams to not score.

The key is whether 8/1 is a fair price for having to predict all 8 teams to score in four games and to make this analysis easier to understand I have looked at BTTS in the EPL 2008-2009 to the current date so we can look at individual teams and work out what price is required just to break even.

The BetFred advert says meet Dave who has won at 12/1 as he backed 4 teams to score on the Betfred enhanced coupon which means that the odds were increased.

What is of great interest is the profile of Dave who is a white male and about 28 years old who wears glasses and the perception would be that he is well educated and probably went to University.

When betfred looked for someone to be the face of their campaign, they would have done a lot of market research and discovered that people who bet on line are drawn to the idea that they  could become a “winner” and they aspire to be like Dave who is well educated and by inference must live in a nice house and obviously has a great job and is a winner in life as he has just had a 12/1 winner backing goals galore and this must be sensible behaviour.

With the increased turnover in people betting on the internet as a result of all the media coverage which has extended to the use of twitter and facebook to trigger “bet stimulation” I would think it would be a good time to regulate the industry to make sure that all advisory services provide their profit and loss for the whole season so that people can make an informed opinion and we must also recognise that past performance is not an indicator of future performance.

BTTS YES betting has become so popular that over the last few months the bookmakers have had to cut the prices because there has been very little betting on BTTS No and this has resulted in a one sided book so the bookmakers do not want to be left in this position so have no choice but to cut the price of BTTS YES.

My question is why is the bet so popular and do people make long term profits from this bet?

Firstly the majority of people bet on an event to happen such as goals or a team to win and this would explain why so few people back a game to end in a draw. The mindset in the majority of people is to follow a perceived trend which is generally triggered by media coverage. What is of great concern is that the majority of people who are betting on BTTS YES are only looking on a game by game basis so if their BTTS bet wins then the “tipster” who advised that bet will reinforce that the bet is a good bet and if it loses it turns into an unlucky bet that was a value bet.

If we look at Arsenal v Manchester City then a number of people backed BTTS Yes because the most high profile advisory service advised the bet.

If you backed BTTS in this game then you lost the bet as the final score was Arsenal 0 Man City 2 and i am wondering how much research went into advising the bet?

We can use predictive modeling to give an expectation of the goals that both teams will score using shot on target data and goal to shot on target expectation.

In this game my predictive model had both teams scoring around 1.6 goals each in the game so on the surface the bet looks like a good idea but you will not believe what the price was as some bookmakers were going as low as 1.53 so they have the belief that there is around a 65% chance that both teams would have scored.

If we look historically at games involving Arsenal at Home to Man City in the EPL, we see that the last 5 games have now ended BTTS NO so that would not have inspired any confidence in backing a 1.53 shot even though each game is a seperate entity.

There are in running factors that will impede goal expectation.

1. Heavy rain will reduce the expectation of goals.

2. A Red card will impede goal expectation to the team with 10 men

3. Lack of motivation can reduce the expectation of a goal.

4. Inability to have the strength of shot to consider expectation of a goal. When QPR played Spurs for  example they never looked like scoring and the data shows that they had no shots on target.

5. Early home goal to a superior side. When a team like Man UTD score an early home goal then a team like West Ham will look to limit the damage. In the game this season West Ham had only one shot on goal and spent most of the game trying to stop Manchester United from adding to the goal scored by Van Persie after 1 minute.

There are in running factors that will increase goal expectation during a game.

1. An early away goal is known to increase goal expectation for the home side so very welcome if you do back BTTS YES.

2. Light showers have the ability to make the ball move faster and allows for quicker circulation of possession.

3. A red card to the superior side allowing for increased expectation of a goal to the inferior side.

4. The ability of a team such as Manchester United and Everton to “fightback” when conceding the first goal

 

If we look at the data for Arsenal at home in the last 4 completed seasons they have an average of 50% BTTS YES so just to break even you would need to take a price of EVENS and against Manchester City the price was 1.53 so I am hoping that you can build a picture that in this game the price was terrible value even if the bet won.

Everton may have had BTTS YES in sixteen of their last 18 games but there is no evidence to suggest more goals are being scored in the EPL and that the distribution of goals is evenly balanced.

If you look at the graphs you will see in the last four completed seasons the price that you needed to have taken just to break even.

My conclusion is simple which is that BTTS YES is an invention by the bookmakers as they make money from it, They have cut prices as there has been an increased interest and their marketing has worked as well as the fact that advisory(fee charging) sites and free sites have promoted the BTTS as well. Bookmakers have cut prices to increase their margin and not because they are losing money on the BTTS bets. If a bookmaker receives many more bets on an outcome then they have to cut the price as they would like a balanced book. A bookmaker does not gamble and if 10 000 people back BTTS YES in the Arsenal v Manchester City game then they will reduce their liability by backing BTTS YES as well or inducing people to back BTTS NO by increasing the price to give a more balanced book.

People are known to conform and this may explain why the majority of people lose when betting and I think the figure is 95% and I am aware that bookmakers expect clients to lose 11% of their volume of bets so if over your life time you bet £50 000 they look for you to lose around £5500 with many people losing rather more.

Personally I would not be in a hurry to be like Dave or Ray and I advise you to do your own research before you “trigger” a bet. Do not assume that your advisory service has done all the data analysis although I acknowledge that there are some free tipping services and advisory services that offer a level of service that is to a very high standard but if they do not post their profit and loss on their website for this season then I personally would be concerned about their ability to produce long term profits. If you consider joining a service then ask them to supply you with their bets for the season and the profit and loss to get an indication of the style of bets and the bottom line which is will they make you long term profits?

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Another plug for the SBC Fink Tank system

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Hit or Myth: Does a new manager make his point or points! (Betting School Article)

This is an article I originally wrote for the Betting School in November 2011. Some of the content should be worthwhile despite some of the data being slightly old.

 

Hit or Myth: Does a new manager make his point or points!

You have to love some of the football myths. I remember being asked which player had won the league title with Arsenal and been involved in the Munich air disaster. The answer I was  informed was John Lukic as his mum had been aboard the plane when pregnant and survived the disaster. This is absolute tosh as he was born nearly 3 years after the air crash and was based on the fact that Harry Gregg saved a woman called Mrs Lukic during the disaster who was pregnant.

Thankfully the advent of the internet means it is a lot easier to check this kind of thing and not embarrass yourself with some made up trivia which I have been guilty in the past. My brother in law likes to remind me of some dodgy trivia question I asked him about Imre Varadi and the teams he had played for which he was able to expose as rubbish and declare my knowledge as ‘bobbins’.

This month I want to look at how teams perform with a new manager. Often when a new manager arrives the perception is that the results will pick up as players try to impress the manager. This is the theory I will try to test this by looking at how teams perform in the games before and after the manager arrives to see if there are any profits to be had. I have decided to look at 4 games either side of the appointment. The reason I have chosen 4 games is then we should get two home and two away matches for each team to give a balanced result set.

I am looking at the English Leagues and have taken the information about managers leaving their jobs from the League Managers Association website which has a lot of data for this.

According the league managers association there have been, on average, just over 50 managerial changes in each of the last 5 seasons as shown below.

League

2006-07

2007-08

2008-09

2009-10

2010-11
Barclays Premier League

12

12

14

6

10
npower Championship

11

13

13

19

15
npower League One

13

12

14

12

17
npower League Two

13

9

9

13

16
Total

49

46

50

50

58

I wanted to be able to exclude any changes that happened in the off-season so to do this I only included matches where the next match after hiring was within 14 days and the last match before a firing was within 14 days. Also I have excluded any changes where the new manager was not in place within 30 days of the initial manager leaving. This leaves us with 129 managerial changes over the 5 years.

I have seen some analysis of this kind of thing before and I was expecting to confirm this as a myth but the results are quite surprising. The first thing to look at us how many matches the teams won in the 4 games before and after the managerial change.

Wins

Games

Win %

4 games before

37

129

29%

3 games before

37

129

29%

2 games before

26

129

20%

1 game before

17

129

13%

1 game after

34

129

26%

2 games after

52

129

40%

3 games after

45

129

35%

4 games after

45

129

35%

You can see the win percentage fall as we get closer to the dismissal and then it picks up in the first game but then makes much bigger jumps in the 3 games after. Taking all 4 games together this equates to a 23% win percentage in the period leading up to the change and then a 34% win percentage afterwards.

Another thing to notice is that it is invariably a bad result that triggers the sacking as there is just a 13% win percentage in the game before a sacking. This is not rocket science but with the number of markets available to bet on for managers being sacked it could help.

After seeing the results the next question that needs to be asked is can we profit from this and the answer looks to be yes if we look past the opening match.

Win %

P/L

4 games before

29%

-33.99

3 games before

29%

-31.69

2 games before

20%

-53.66

1 game before

13%

-76.61

1 game after

26%

-15.75

2 games after

40%

24.54

3 games after

35%

8.12

4 games after

35%

-0.28

The second and third game after the managerial change look to be the key games for getting a profit and there is some logic to this. In the first game the manager cannot change very much and sometimes is even just watching from the stands. I also believe in this game the prices reflect the fact that bookmakers expect some improvement. In the second and third game the manager has been able to work with the players and get across any new methods/tactics etc. In the fourth game the win percentage is the same as the third game but no doubt the fact that the team has improved will mean the bookmakers will adjust their prices to be lower and so the profit is eradicated.

I must that admit when I chose this choice of topic I firmly had the idea in my head it was going to be a myth but now it is time to dig deeper and see if we can find any more profitable angles.

Looking at the 129 changes the only manager that was able to produce 4 wins out of 4 was Guus Hiddink when he took over from Big Phil at Chelsea. Maybe there could be some scope in looking at the results by division.

Profit/Loss

Barclays Premier League

npower Championship

npower League One

npower League Two

Conference

4 games before

-10.66

-17.47

-6.26

-1.15

1.55

3 games before

-10.76

-19.42

0.09

-0.17

1.57

2 games before

-21.88

-19.84

-10.74

-8.95

-3

1 game before

-23.86

-26.19

-9.62

-16.91

-0.37

1 game after

-2.31

6.54

-10.66

-4.97

-1.35

2 games after

-2.49

13.89

1.52

12.17

2.45

3 games after

-11.11

0.69

15.82

5.6

0.12

4 games after

7.82

-3.68

-8.83

4.85

2.56

This table above shows the raw profit and loss by division. The Premier League still shows a loss for the 4 games after a managerial change. Of the 4 games it is only the fourth one that shows any profit. If we look at the Championship it is the reverse and only the fourth game does not make a profit and overall there are some decent results. League One shows an overall loss for the games after managerial change but the big loss is in the first game after the change which we discussed earlier as probably being no surprise. League Two shows a decent profit for all but the first game in and is the most profitable of the lot. There are not many results for the Conference and it is hard to take anything positive or negative from there. I will remove the Conference from the rest of the results.

If we look at the 4 games post change as a whole in the table below we can now more clearly see the loss in the Premier League and the fact the other Leagues are all quite consistent in terms of win percentage. Why is the Premier League different? My personal take is that in the Premier League has huge gulfs in class and that a poor team is a poor team and no amount of managerial magic can change that. Yes, some teams over perform but by and large most teams play to their own level. In the other divisions maybe the improvement brought about by a manager can make a very big difference.

4 games post managerial change

Barclays Premier League

npower Championship

npower League One

npower League Two
Won

34

56

45

33
Total

112

164

132

96
Win %

30%

34%

34%

34%
Profit/Loss

-8.09

17.44

-2.15

17.65

So now let’s pull all this together and see if we can find a profitable angle. The Premier League looks worth avoiding and also we have seen that the first game does not seem to yield decent results and that by the fourth game any improvement has been spotted by the bookmakers. The results for the second and third game a new manager has in charge of a team are shown below by the 3 lower divisions.

Won

Total

Win %

Profit/Loss

ROI
npower Championship

29

82

35%

14.58

18%
npower League One

28

66

42%

17.34

26%
npower League Two

19

48

40%

17.77

37%
All

76

196

39%

49.69

25%

Some very nice returns in there and with a total of nearly 200 games spanning 5 seasons there is an average of around 40 games per year that would qualify. Something worth looking at for sure and also on the flipside you would not want to oppose a team with a new manager in these games.

The new broom does look to sweep clean in the lower divisions and I would put this one down as a hit for them. In terms of the Premier League I do not think it makes much difference and would not be too concerned with this factor.

If you have any suggestions for any myths to investigate please contact me.

Leon Pidgeon