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ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE: STATS AND RESOURCES

ENGLISH PREMIER LEAGUE: STATS AND RESOURCES

By Tobias Gourlay of Betfair

It does matter more when there is money on it,but you don’t mention that it is also likely to cost more unless research is done into where to put that money.

As the new football season approaches, the most serious – and successful - punters are preparing to take a long-term view on the Premier League. Not for them the last-minute wager on the match they are about to go to the pub for. Well, occasionally, perhaps, but only once some homework has been done.

Playing a long game means being prepared to assess your P&L line on a seasonal basis. Whether a punter makes 25 bets a season or 2,500 bets a season, the principle of value remains the same.

Briefly, Betfair’s odds on a particular outcome reflect someone’s view on how likely that outcome is. For example, odds of 1.25 – Manchester United’s price to win their opening-day home game against Birmingham – suggest the bet will pay out 80% of the time; if the match was played 100 times, United would win 80 times.

If someone has an idea that United would actually win that match 90 times out of 100, they should take that bet because, if they are right, after the 100th game they would have a profit equivalent to the payouts from the 10 extra matches they won (therein lies the holy grail of value). Assuming – quite reasonably, experience tells us – that no one makes the right bet all of the time, following the value seems to be the surest way to long-term profit.

Now, where would someone get such an idea about the value in United’s price? They might be a fan who makes a leap of faith every time he places a bet. They might have done some qualitative analysis and decided that the Darren Fletcher-Anderson midfield axis is underrated and will be to the fore in the coming campaign.

Better, perhaps, they might know that Manchester United have won 18 of their last 20 similar matches. In which case, they take the 1.25 price because (assuming all other factors are constant) it is better than the 1.10 they think it should be.

Some punters will be prepared to wade through every Premier League game ever played to find a riveting stat like the one above.

That’s great, but for those with less time on their hands – perhaps they have a job or a girlfriend – there are internet resources to help them out. Football-data.co.uk, for example, provides free spreadsheets containing information that can help identify value bets across many markets.

BettorLogic.com releases statistically based betting recommendations each week, as well as titbits of quantitative information about the importance of individual players to their clubs, in the hope that readers will then pay them for more comprehensive data.

The free scraps hint at trends that others in the market might have missed and can form the basis of value bets to be made again and again through the season.

Betfair’s own www.stats.betradar.com/statistics/betfaircom/?language=en page will provide basic statistical support (or not) to those with pre-conceived ideas about how a match will go off. Reckon that Tottenham’s opening-day home fixture with Liverpool is going to be a low-scorer? It is easy to find out here that 13/19 league games at White Hart Lane produced -2.5 Goals last season, just like 11/19 of the Reds’ away matches. Those numbers suggest 1.60 would be a fair price. Closer to kick-off, the price will probably settle around 1.90. That’s some value right there, if the numbers on their own convince you.

There’s a nagging question, though. How can you know whether a statistic is relevant or not? In short, you cannot. But you can make sure you have the best possible idea about its relevance. If you found out that those 13 low-scoring games at White Hart Lane came at the beginning of last season, would the bet be as appealing if Spurs were on an unbroken run of 13 straight home games with -2.5 Goals? You decide. This sort of information is easily come by at many different websites, including the official Premier League site.

There are also qualitative factors that must be taken into account, even if they cannot be quantified. If, heaven forefend, someone didn’t know that Liverpool sold Fernando Torres and Steven Gerrard to Manchester City yesterday, and the rest of the market did, they would probably find the Reds’ longer-than-usual win price rather appealing.

ESPN’s Soccernet tends to get this sort of news right and early, and that helps it stand apart from some of the UK-based sites whose pedigree is not so obvious. Official club websites vary in usefulness, but once a good one has been discovered, it can become a very useful source of team news and the like.

A small investment of time in crunching the numbers and researching the details will help maximise your chances of a good return on your financial investment in the coming season.

By Pendil at British Betting and Gaming Sites.