- The Premier League returns after the Iternational break with a full programme of matches.
- The Racing programme features Champions Day at Ascot (see below for Neil's tip) and over jumps one of the first Cheltenham meetings of the autumn.
- In Golf on the European Tour: Volvo World Match Play Championship takes place at the London Golf Club in Kent.
- In Tennis the ATP and WTA Kremlin Cups in Moscow conclude.
- In Rugby Union the European Champions Cup (successor to the Heineken Cup) Pool matches begin
Free Tip of the Week
The Road to Riches features regular free tips from Betting Emporium writers. Today Neil Channing looks at one of the last big races of the 2014 Flat racing season the QIPCO Champions stakes at Ascot
"The Champion Stakes is going to be run on pretty soft, tacky ground at Ascot. The results at Newmarket on softish ground reminded us, if we needed to be reminded, that a change in going can really randomise results, the top horses may not run up to their best and some outsiders may be able to show form we have never seen before on ground they have never encountered. I certainly won't be rushing to back any favourites at Ascot today and I think the headline race offers a great chance to back some outsiders.
The favourite Cirrus Des Aigles will love the ground, could easily win and at 13/8 it is probably priced correctly. We aren't trying to find horses that are priced correctly though so we'll leave this. The 2nd favourite Free Eagle is a horse with a massive potential for volatility in his price. He won a Group 3 race very easily on his last run and his jockey and trainer are saying all the stuff that ought to make the price way too short. I could never consider backing one going into Group 1 for the 1st time at such a short price but again I wouldn't be totally surprised if it won. With the trainer expressing doubts over it even running if the ground is too soft though this would be one to swerve to my mind.
I was always one of the biggest fans of Sir Henry Cecil and Noble Mission running today will remind many people of the great Frankel. This horse is one who was considered to be a complete rogue at the start of the year and it wasn't until they found the key which is to front-run on soft ground that he became a winner and the first group 1 winner at Warren Place since the death of the great man. I think people have cottoned on to the whole Cecil factor, to the fact that the horse will love the ground and not enough to the fact that the stable is generally sadly declining and may be really out of form right now. I could understand the people betting a week ago at double-figure prices but no at around 5/1, in fact I wouldn't take 7/1.
Ruler of the World won a Derby and ran 3rd in this last year off a disappointing Arc. I could easily see the same sort of thing happening here and I wouldn't put you off an each-way bet if that was your plan. I would need a slightly bigger price though.
Ayrad and Sheikhzayedroad are just not good enough and hold no interest to me but the other three runners are all interesting in terms of shooting for a place at a big price and all three could win.
Al Kazeem ran a close up middle of the pack race in the Arc, he stays well and could be suited by the battle they'll have tomorrow. I do just wonder about the really soft ground so I'm going to reluctantly pass. Pether's Moon is definitely a horse that ought to have won more races and he can be annoying when he comes there cruising before forgetting to win. A winner at Group 2 level and a consistent placer at Group 2 and 3 level this horse has not had the chance to contest the absolute top races. I could definitely see an argument for saying that he is improving, that he loves the soft ground, that he travels strongly in 1m4f races and that this slog over 1m2f in a race that might not be the greatest ever Group 1 race could give him a shot at placing at least.
The one I really like though is Western Hymn. This horse won the Sandown Derby trial on real soft ground and then was a little disappointing in the Derby where he was hampered and possibly didn't stay. After a nice long gap the horse won easily in a Group 2 race in France on really soft ground and then got beaten in another one of those when favourite. I love the trainer, I love the fact the horse gets the trip and goes on the ground and I love to bet a 3-year old and to forgive a horse one run.
I'm having 8 Points each-way Pether's Moon at 20/1 1/4 123 with Ladbrokes and some small firms.
I'm having 12 Points each-way Western Hymn at 16/1 1/4 123 with Ladbrokes and some small firms."
Bookmaker reviews and advice
Getting the best price available is very important for all those who take their betting seriously.
Please open an account with all those bookmakers on the page on this link that you do not already have an account with using the links provided.
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For an interview with Neil and Joe published recently in PokerPlayer Magazine "Betting Emporium: Sports betting from the experts" please see here
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Note: London’s Royal Courts of Justice has ruled against the Gibraltar Betting and Gaming Association Legal challenge to the UK's newly passed Gambling (Licensing and Advertising) Act.
Last Friday, a judgement supporting the United Kingdom Gambling Commission's impending introduction of the gaming law's new licensing system, a 15 percent point of consumption tax for gaming operators and new regulatory framework was handed down.
The result of this is that currently unlicensed operators such as Pinnacle will discontinue services to UK customers from the end of this month.
More news on a Pinnacle (and others) licence application when we get it
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Successful sports bettors have skills and talents that allow them to profit in a market where few can. Work ethic, discipline, and a talent for analysing information makes them a rare breed. I look at the amount of diligence put in, say, on the NFL weekly reports on Betting Emporium. One practice that sports bettors on any level should apply to their betting acumen is; review! At the end of any session, be that a day, a week or a season you should be asking yourself these types of questions:
Did I consistently beat the market?
Great indications of a successful sports bettor is their ability to get out ahead of their betting market and hold a ticket with a more advantageous number than the market closes at.
How many fortunate wins/unfortunate losses?
This can be extremely tricky to gauge. It takes a realistic person, but with the right mindset it can be done and is exponentially beneficial. These bets can be defined as games that had an event/series of events that altered what seemed to be a decided outcome. You can be on the "right side" of a game and lose. Conversely, you can be on the "wrong side" of a game and win a bet.
I take for example three games in last week's NFL slate where as a result of late scores in each, one or both of overs and supremacy were all "back-doored" in favour of the public and cost the Vegas books millions.
The Jets (+10 pre-match) were 24-17 down having fought well and were set to cover the spread (80% of bets were the other way), and for the game to go under. The quarterback throws an interception with seconds to go, returned for a touchdown.
The Redskins (+7 pre-match) were 23-20 down late in the game. The game was just about to go under, and the Redskins about to cover. With 29 seconds to go, the Redskins quarterback throws an interception, returned for a touchdown.
Last Monday night the Rams were 24-17 down and with a minute to go threw an interception, returned for a touchdown. Unders lost, overs won...
As a rational bettor, it is not outlandish to chalk all three outcomes down as “Bad Beats” for the player who wagered on the ‘Under’ (Betting Emporium, coincidentally, happened to be this way on a couple of the games) , and an extremely fortunate result for those who dabbled with the ‘Over’. Understanding that we are “gamblers” and a massive swing during the course of a sporting event is not uncommon is important. Whose analysis was right, those who went onto unders, or overs? The outcome doesn't necessarily tell you!
Do I have an unjustified bias when I bet?
While there are numerous trends and styles of betting, many recreational (and some professional) bettors may have a bias towards a certain subset of teams. The difference between the two is professionals have a reason towards, say, siding with home double-digit Underdogs in the NFL, while many recreational bettors routinely pound Favourites and ‘Overs’. Beyond a natural inclination in the two groups of bettors to be either contrarian or momentum players, tracking certain sub-sets and recording your results may not only expose a negative tendency, but allow an investor to realise a strong area in his handicapping. Adapting to a change in the market comes much easier to a bettor who reviews each betting block and deciphers where profitable positions still exist, compared to the player who continually plays into –EV (expected value) situations.
What's new on Betting Emporium?
English Football - Premier League Games Stuart analyses the week's games in the Premier League, free to access here
English Football - Championship GamesStuart analyses the week's games in the Championship, free to access here
English Non League Football - Conference Games - Alan analyses the week's games in the Conference, free to access here
Premier League Statistical Analysis – You can read thishere still FREE to all registered users
Football by Brodders - across European leagues, and including Champions League analysis, is available here
- The Premier League is on an International break for qualifying matches for Euro 2016 including England's game in Estonia on Sunday.
- Sochi hosts the inaugural RussianGrand Prix
- The Racing programme features flat meetings at Newmarket (including the Cesarewitch) and York and national hunt meetings at Chepstow and Hexham
- In Golf on the European Tour the Portugal Masters and on the USPGA Tour the Frys.com Open in Napa, California
- In Tennis the Shanghai Rolex Masters, Shanghai, China.
- In Rugby League, the Super League Grand Final between St Helens and Wigan Warriors
Free Tip of the Week
The Road to Riches features regular free tips from Betting Emporium writers. Today I look at an NFL sub-market for Sunday's game in the NFC North, where the Pittsburgh Steelers meet the Cleveland Browns
Quarterback Ben Roethlisberger of the Steelers has, on an otherwise inconsistent team, been on top form in the last three games having completed 77-of-106 passes (72.6%) for 783 yards (7.39 Yards per attempt) and a 6 touchdowns, no Interceptions. On the opening game of the season against tomorrow's opponent's Cleveland he threw for 365 passing yards and in the second game between them tomorrow Cleveland look unlikely to have top corner Joe Haden available. Even with Haden, the Browns rank 28th (of 32 teams) in pass defense and gave up four TDs to Titans quarterbacks last week. With Haden missing last Sunday, the other starting cornerback Buster Skrine was beaten, in blown coverages, for touchdowns. Cleveland used an undrafted rookie at slot corner. First-round pick at cornerback Justin Gilbert has already been benched. They are allowing an AFC-high 6.37 yards per play
Over the first five games of the season Roethlisberger has thrown 51 times to his top wide receiver Antonio Brown, the next closest being Heath Miller with 31. In week one Brown took the Browns for 116 yards on 5 receptions, with Haden covering him. Tomorrow, without Haden, the Browns have a problem. Their defense is far more effective up front, against the run but they have to guard against the excellent running back Le-Veon Bell. This will make it difficult to double-team Antonio Brown on the outside and leave themselves under-manned against the rush
Looking at the first touchdown market in the light of this potential mis-match, I considered Antonio Brown a 9-2 or 5-1 shot. I was very pleased to see 7-1 about with both Coral and William Hill (will ignore the 15-2 at Paddy Power, non-bookmakers for me and probably for some of you)
Brown is a big play wide receiver, already with 511 receiving yards this season, and five touchdowns. The Receiving yards sub-market tomorrow has him going for 90-95 yards, which if anything undercooks it. 100+ yards which he has done twice this season is a strong possibility
He's a very decent bet to score the first touchdown, a sporting bet to score 2+ touchdowns (as he has done twice this season), a solid overs bet in the 10/11 each of two receiving yards market. My bet here is
10 points Antonio Brown First Touchdown Scorer Pittsburgh Steelers at Cleveland Browns with Coral or William Hill
Bookmaker reviews and advice
Getting the best price available is very important for all those who take their betting seriously.
Please open an account with all those bookmakers on the page on this link that you do not already have an account with using the links provided.
For an interview with Neil and Joe published last week in PokerPlayer Magazine "Betting Emporium: Sports betting from the experts" please see here
"The glass is half full"
For many obvious reasons, optimism is a good character trait to possess. However when it comes to betting your optimistic nature can turn into a liability and affect your betting performance negatively.
The Optimism Bias lets you believe that you are less likely to be affected by negative events than other people, and this bias can be part of everyday life but also part of betting as well.
Optimism does have a very obvious advantage - it feels good. For as long as you can maintain your optimism it will be easier to suppress doubt and negative emotions. For that reason we intuitively tend to find information that reinforces our optimistic outlook. This is one of the manifestations of this confirmation bias.
You can see this when you decide to make a bet. Usually, if researching, you will be looking for arguments that support your bet. In fact you should look for counter-arguments with (at least) the same vigour, in order to judge the merits of the bet as objectively as possible.
This is where statistics can be valuable: They force you to attach some form of objective weight to the facts and establish a consistent relationship between them. Your intuition however will very often lead you to search for more reasons that support your bet, and even violate consistency for the sake of finding these reasons. This leads inexperienced bettors to not place enough weight on reasons that speak against the bet.
Feeling in control improves your optimistic outlook more than would be justified in many cases. A classic example of this is driving. Many people feel there is less of a chance of an accident when they are the ones behind the wheel.
We tend to forget very easily that even the best drivers are still very much at the mercy of the drivers of the other vehicles. No matter what our skills, a huge part of the risk of accident lies with the other drivers, whose behaviour we can't control.
Betting gives you a feeling of being in control as well, but it's a feeling of control that you are likely going to over-estimate. This is because the final result of any given match is often more random than we assume: Red cards, deflected shots, missed field goals, bad bounces of a golf ball, stewards enquiries, the list is long! All of these and more can steer an event in an unexpected direction.
You only have control over what betting odds you are going to accept for any given bet. You're never in control of the actual outcome. This is why successful betting isn't solely about picking winners, it's about getting the right prices too, and once you have done so accepting lack of control and randomness is something you have to live with
What else is on Betting Emporium this weekend?
English Football - Championship GamesStuart analyses the week's games in the Championship, free to access here
English Non League Football - Conference and FA Cup Qualifying Games - Alan analyses Conference and FA Cup Qualifying games this weekend, free to access here
Football by Brodders - across European leagues, and including Champions League analysis, is available here
Posted on 29 Sep 2014 10:30 in
Weekly Articles "Road to Riches" by Rich 'Tighty' Prew
Coming Up this weekend
- It is theFifth weekend of the NFL Season. Neil has had a great start with his weekly write ups, including seven out of eight winning tips last week. For Neil's week five Sunday selections...
- The Premier League continues with Chelsea hosting Arsenal a highlight for Sunday.
- Suzuka hosts the Japanese Grand Prix, typhoon permitting, as the 2014 Formula One season enters its final stages
- The Racing programme includes the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe on Sunday (previewed below) and in the UK Saturday meetings at Newmarket and Ascot
- In Golf, after the excitement of the Ryder cup, the European tour resumes with the Alfred Dunhill Links Championship on the Old Course at St. Andrews
- In cricket the Champions League T20 final takes place in Bangalore between two IPL teams CSK and KKR and Australia begin a tour against Pakistan in Dubai.
Free Tip of the Week
The Road to Riches features regular free tips from Betting Emporium writers. Today, Neil Channing looks at Sunday’s Prix De L’Arc De Triomphe at Longchamp, the highlight of a card containing seven Group One races
"Some people love the Arc because they consider it to be the pinnacle of the season, a gathering of horses from around Europe to discover which is the best of 3-year olds and older horses and of both sexes over the classic distance. I love the Arc because it isn't a handicap and some firms offer e/w 1/4 1234.
Even if this race was a 20-runner handicap where the bigger priced horses were 33/1 this would be pretty tasty for the place part of an each-way bet but now consider that there are six horses at 66/1 and over who can be given little chance and we are sure to have a good bet whatever we do. We should also consider that in the last twelve years only two horses drawn higher than nine have won. I'm happy to rule out those drawn really high without blinking this time and the horses drawn one have historically found it hard to get a run so we'll throw out Avenir Certain too.
We can also throw out a couple of doubtful stayers in Just Away and Avenir Certain, (just in case you didn't throw her out before). On top of that we'll bin Treve who was so impressive from the wide draw last year but who just hasn't looked the same animal this year and who seems to need a lot of cut in the ground to let herself down. Wouldn't really be that interested in her at double the price.
The high drawn ones we have discarded are Taghrooda, who may not be as great as we once hoped, Ivanhowe and Kingston Hill.
We are left with nine possibles, but I can throw a couple of those out without too much heartache.
Gold Ship looks solid in that he stays all day but he is quirky and may prefer a bit of cut in the ground. Not one to rely on I think. Prince Gibralter would need to improve a fair deal although the faster ground should help and Ruler of the World will surely not be able to be ridden the way he was last time. If he wins it's not as good a race as we thought.
Ectot is definitely interesting and it wouldn't surprise me that much but there are definite trip doubts and he needs to improve and the price does not reflect these things.
Tapestry beat Taghrooda at York but we've now found out that Taghrooda was in season and it's just possible she is not so great as we thought. The last run was poor but she'll like the trip and ground, I just can't see any real value in her at the prices.
Three year old fillies have done great in the Arc, they have a definite advantage at the weights at this time of year and you'd be up £42 if you bet them for £1 level stakes since 2008. The one I like of that group is Harp Star who was badly ridden/unlucky (watch it and decide) last time. She has a slight stamina doubt and a draw of 12 otherwise I think she is pretty decent each-way material at around 7/1.
I'm going to settle on two horses that are drawn low and who definitely stay the trip.
Flintshire is trained by the master. His jockey was one of those ridden to sleep by Frankie last time when the horse was 6/4 favourite. I'm going to forgive that and remember that this is a Group 1 winner over course and distance being offered at 25/1 four places.
Dolniya was also beaten in a trial and also left things a bit late. Ridden by one of the best jockeys, the stable is having a great year and he hasn't got masses to find on form. Seems a big price.
I'm having 10 points each-way Flintshire at 25/1 1/4 1234 with Hills (would rather take 20/1 1234 than 25/1 123 as an alternative).
I'm having 12 points each-way Dolniya at 40/1 1/4 1234 with Bet365, Paddy Power and Betfair Sports (would take 33/1 1234 over 40/1 123)".
Bookmaker reviews and advice
Getting the best price available is very important for all those who take their betting seriously.
Please open an account with all those bookmakers on the page on this link that you do not already have an account with using the links provided.
Note: You may have seen that The UK Gambling (Licensing and Advertising) Act 2014, set to come into effect on Oct. 1, has been postponed until Nov.1, due to a High Court challenge from the Gibraltar Betting and Gaming Association. This enables operators like Pinnacle and SBOBet to offer their services to UK based customers for the next month. More news as the story develops
For an interview with Neil and Joe published this week in PokerPlayer Magazine "Betting Emporium: Sports betting from the experts" please see here
Before I started putting together these weekly articles I spoke to Neil and Joe. Well Neil spoke, mostly. One of the points he made was that he frequently saw a confusion between those with specialist knowledge on a sport or sports and those with expertise in sports betting. That stuck with me because what we all see a lot of, particularly in marketing campaigns within the industry, is a proliferation of ex-sports stars becoming tipsters being promoted as experts by bookmakers as if these are tips you and I should follow.
This then reminded me of the "Green Lumber Fallacy". One of the most successful traders to ever buy and sell green lumber – which is freshly cut wood – actually had no idea what he was trading. He spent his entire green lumber career believing the product was just wood painted green, and not newly cut trees.
Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his recent book ‘Antifragile’ outlined a second similar situation: a star Swiss Franc trader who’s inability to locate Switzerland on the map didn’t hinder his ability to make money trading its currency.
These two people simply understand risk, something that many other people do not. Translate that through to betting and replace the word risk with value. While knowing about the sport and the value is obviously the ideal situation, it’s vital to remember that understanding value is as important, if not more so, than knowledge of the sport itself.
It’s understandable that bettors might give weight to the opinion of say an ex-football player with regard to betting on football, but football and betting on football are two completely separate domains. The opinion of the ex-player pushed out by a bookmaker is merely part of a marketing strategy, especially when you see it accompanied by the phrase "My five-fold today is..." because of course the bookmaker wants you to do multiples, and wants you to do multiples on favourites. Even that bastion of Saturday afternoon fun, "Soccer Saturday" have started doing it, either side of adverts for their bookmaking arm "Our multiple today is..."
Since Neil made the point to me, I've been watching things with a keener eye and realise more clearly that:
Just because someone has detailed knowledge or experience of a sport doesn’t mean they have the required knowledge to bet successfully on that sport.
Talking heads/journalists/tipsters love a narrative, a story that neatly explains for example a teams loss of form, and they love even more to back-fit narratives to explain when the story moves in a totally unexpected direction (as is often the case).
Of course, no one is suggesting sports knowledge is totally irrelevant for betting on sport, but the narrative in mainstream media is to refer to talking heads as predictive experts, but this generally means they are rarely appropriately placed to be judging value or making predictions that you should follow.
The inevitable conclusion, of course, is to read Betting Emporium more (funny that). Sports knowledge, yes. Value knowledge....a more important yes.
What's new on Betting Emporium?
English Football - Premier League Games Stuart analyses the week's games in the Premier League, free to access here
English Football - Championship GamesStuart analyses the week's games in the Championship, free to access here
English Non League Football - Conference Games - Alan analyses the week's games in the Conference, free to access here
Premier League Statistical Analysis – Five winning weeks from six for the Premier League Over 2.5 goals analysis and a ROI+13.28%. You can read this here still FREE to all registered users
Football by Brodders - across European leagues, and including Champions League analysis, is available here
Posted on 22 Sep 2014 09:57 in
Weekly Articles "Road to Riches" by Rich 'Tighty' Prew
Coming Up this weekend
- The 2014 Ryder Cup concludes this weekend at Gleneagles and after Day One Europe lead 5-3. Pre-event coverage from Neil Channing is hereSee below for further thoughts/tips from Neil.
- It is thefourth weekend of the NFL Season. Neil has had a great start with his weekly write ups. For Neil's week four Sunday selections...
- The Premier League continues with the Merseyside derby on Saturday lunchtime and the North London derby late Saturday afternoon
- The Racing programme includes flat meetings at Newmarket including the Cambridgeshire Handicap and the Cheveley Park Stakes, Haydock, Chester and Ripon
- Aviva Premiership matches continue with a highlight Northampton hosting Bath
- In cricket the Champions League T20 continues this weekend
Free Tip of the Week
The Road to Riches features regular free tips from Betting Emporium writers. Today, Neil Channing continues his analysis of the Ryder Cup which concludes this weekend....
"When Tighty told me I was down to be the free bet guy for Roads to Riches this week I said I thought it would have to be the Ryder Cup, being as that is THE event of the week. The problem is that by the time you might read this the players will be out for the morning day two fourballs and so it's hard to suggest an in-running bet. I can't give you an afternoon one as we don't yet know who is playing.
Luckily the odds-compilers and the people playing around on Betfair have come to our rescue.
Anyone who read and decided to follow the advice I gave in my Ryder Cup preview the other day should be on Justin Rose top European each-way at 7/1 and Justin Rose Top Englishman at 6/4. With two points out of a maximum five from two games things are looking good for both bets. I don't want to seem blinkered at all but I do believe the price on Rose for top European Points Scorer that is offered overnight is still too big.
Justin has played two games and he'll play tomorrow morning. He is slight odds on to win and for him and Stenson to get to 3 points each, they are 5/1 to tie and both get to 2.5. I think either result will mean they get to play a 4th game in the afternoon but even if they do not and they "just" play four games I would expect them to be around the same price each to win their single. I'm allowing them 0.65 of a point for each of the singles match and the Saturday morning fourball. Even if you think I'm a bit strong there they are at least in for one point from the two and they also have a chance to play Saturday afternoon and be in for at least 0.4 more points on average.
The guys on half or none have almost no chance to catch them and some of their prices would not attract me if you quadrupled them.
It is a bit of a guessing game as to who plays in the afternoon and you might say that Justin wasn't putting all that great and it can't help when a bee stings your thumb, but all I can say is that 6/4 looks more like the price than 2/1 to my mind. You might also say that in your opinion he'll dead heat with Stenson a lot. It's certainly possible, but that would still make you a profit. All I know is that both are playing well, both are on two points but one was 10/1 on this market while the other was 7/1 at the start and they are now close to the same price. If I was told one of the two will play five matches that one is still Justin and not Henrik.
If you wake up and read this and they've teed off I would still suggest checking out the in-running markets.
I'm having 12 points at 2/1 Justin Rose Top Euro Points Scorer with Ladbrokes and Hills (Sportingbet are currently 9/4 if you are quick)."
Bookmaker reviews and advice
Getting the best price available is very important for all those who take their betting seriously.
Please open an account with all those bookmakers on the page on this link that you do not already have an account with using the links provided.
Today a look at a betting bias that has its roots in the field of cognitive psychology, The Bandwagon Effect.
This is a bias based on how we prefer to be comfortable and avoid any social pressure when group-think is on the agenda. We see this across many aspects of life, for example when a new technology or product bursts onto the scene a notable example being the internet in the last half of the 1990’s. Investors went bonkers and group-thought their way to financial disaster. Investors did not want to be left behind while others enjoyed the gains being made in "new economy" stocks.
So, how does this become a betting bias? How many times have you analysed a game, found yourself a bet or bets, only to read a forum, spot a tweet or browse a betting site and notice that there are numerous people taking the opposite side of your bet? You might think that these people have better reasoning than you, or know something you don't. Unless you are detached from the thinking of the crowd, this can result in not following your own judgement or switching sides.
So this is a betting bias based on the fear of being wrong and logically has its basis in odds, and favouring the head of the market. A person who is uninformed or poorly informed and wanting to have a bet will base his opinions on the views of a majority of people.
It is a common occurrence when you look at high profile games that gain a lot of public interest with social media, television and office water-cooler discussions going into overdrive. Often the popular or highest profile team ends up being "over-backed" moving betting lines away from "fair value".
Following on from last week's conclusions on "Recency Bias" what you will often see in Betting Emporium analysis is a look at price trends in the light of public backing, and public versus professional backing, trying to highlight where the Bandwagon has taken prices against the writers' notion of the correct price and benefitting from opportunities that result. We, the reader, can use that judgement to offset the potential Bandwagon effect in our bets. The Professional bettor will ignore the bandwagon and concentrate on his own research and analysis
What's new on Betting Emporium?
English Football - Premier League Games Stuart analyses the week's games in the Premier League, free to access here
English Football - Championship GamesStuart analyses the week's games in the Championship, free to access here
English Non League Football - Conference Games - Alan analyses the week's games in the Conference, free to access here
Premier League Statistical Analysis – FIVE OUT OF FIVE winning weeks so far in the 2014-15 season. You can read this here still FREE to all registered users
Football by Brodders - across European leagues, and including Champions League analysis, is available here
Posted on 15 Sep 2014 10:08 in
Weekly Articles "Road to Riches" by Rich 'Tighty' Prew
Coming Up this weekend
- It is the third weekend of the NFL Season. Neil has had a great start with his weekly write ups with successivewinning weeks to open the season, up over 100 points and over 38% ROI. After another winning bet on Thursday night, for Neil's week three Sunday selections...
- The Premier League continues with Manchester City at home to Chelsea a big game at the top of the table on Sunday
- The racing programme includes meetings at Ayr, Newmarket and Newbury
- The F1 season enters the final six races with the Singapore Grand Prix on Sunday lunchtime, UK time
- Aviva Premiership matches on the third weekend of the season
Next Week: Look out for Ryder Cup Analysis - The 2014 Ryder Cup is at Gleneagles from September 23rd-28th. Coverage on Betting Emporium from Neil Channing
Free Tip of the Week
The Road to Riches features regular free tips from Betting Emporium writers. Today, our first look in this weekly column at Formula One, where one of the great spectacles of the season the night-time Singapore Grand Prix takes place on Sunday.
The season has of course been dominated by the Mercedes team, who have taken best advantage of the sweeping change of regulations with the introduction of electric-hybrid engines, turbo boosts and energy recovery systems and clearly continue to have the best engine package compared to all other suppliers. The result of this is that the Hamilton/Rosberg pair head the market for every Grand Prix, and Singapore is no different with 2/1 the pair, 10/1 bar the front two for the race win.
Singapore though is a street circuit that reduces the effect of the power advantage that Mercedes has, in common with circuits like Monaco and Hungaroring and maximises the aerodynamic package through slow-ish corners. These are ideal Red Bull Racing conditions, and indeed they have won the last three renewals of Singapore.
Of course the competitive environment of 2014 is very different to 2011-13 but the Red Bull performance at Monaco (Ricciardo on the podium) and Hungary (Ricciardo the winner) confirms that on the "slower" circuits where outright power is less than important, the Red Bull package is competitive enough to challenge the Mercedes on certain tracks and in certain circumstances. This race could be one of those.despite the disadvantage of the Renault power unit.
Vettel has yet to win a race this season, but his team mate Daniel Ricciardo has won three times. The pecking order at Red Bull has changed for this year at least with Vettel consistently finishing behind his younger team mate and now suffering another engine problem in practice today.
Ricciardo has only been able to beat both Mercedes where misfortune has struck Hamilton and/or Rosberg but reliability problems are a strong possibility in Singapore. It is a fascinating race because it is the longest race in the F1 calendar at almost two hours, one of the hardest on brakes, with a 100% record of a safety car (one in each of the six races to date at Singapore), a long slow pit stop and a choice of the softest tyres which cannot do the 308km marathon in one stop. It is always a challenge and instinctively I want to find ways to oppose the short-priced Mercedes one-two because of these elements that can "randomise" results.
I am writing before qualifying, of course, and after the first two practice sessions. This afternoon in the second session Ricciardo was only 0.3secs adrift of Hamilton's fastest lap - just 0.1secs adrift of the margin the Australian had said he believed Red Bull needed to be within to have a chance - and on race pace the two Mercedes drivers and Ricciardo looked closely matched.
My idea is to split 20 points as follows:
4 points Daniel Ricciardo to win the Singapore Grand Prix 10-1 Betfred , Skybet or Bet365
6 points Daniel Ricciardo top two finish 3.4 Betfair . Expect better liquidity over the weekend, would take 9/4+ once the fixed odds bookmakers offer the market
10 points Daniel Ricciardo podium finish, 17/20 Betway 5/6 generally including BetVictor or William Hill. Hoping for Evens plus after qualifying, as a saver for the above two bets
- note 2.1 was available with VCBet but we'll record evens for our records
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Today a look at a cognitive/behavioural bias that Neil mentioned in one of his weekly write-ups last week, Recency Bias
Recency can be a problem for bettors that’s difficult to overcome. You focus on the most recent events you’ve experienced and its easy to neglect older information. We don’t so much integrate new information with the old as use it to overwrite our memories.
For bettors recency may have a couple of different effects. Positive recency makes you a momentum gambler, a sort of living incarnation of a goldfish, forever surprised by the same piece of seaweed. Negative recency makes you a contrarian solidly heading away from short-term trends, some of which may be valid, in search of value. Negative recency is strongly associated with a belief in mean reversion and this can work well in some sports such as the NFL which is structured for competitive balance and against the perpetuation of short term trends. In other sports, perhaps Premier League football, you can go a long time waiting for the top six to revert to the mean, with competitive imbalance persisting helped by TV deals, absence of salary caps and rich owners etc
Recency is a special case of what’s known as the serial position effect, a finding that the order in which information is presented matters greatly to our ability to recall it from memory. To be precise the first items in a list are generally remembered – the primacy effect – and the last ones, the recency effect. Mostly we either fail to remember or misremember the stuff in the middle.
However, the recency effect doesn’t generally just refer to remembering stuff from lists, it’s also used to refer to an autobiographical effect in which people tend to remember stuff that’s happened to them recently more vividly than things that happened further back in the past. "I backed this team last week, they won" and "I am never backing them again after what happened last week" being the types of thoughts we've all gone through!
Positive and negative recency are both observable in normal human behaviour. Perhaps the most common forms of these appear in the “hot-hand effect” and the “gambler’s fallacy” respectively. In the former people erroneously believe that players in certain sports get on a roll and demonstrate a run of success over and above what they’d normally achieve. In the latter there’s an expectation that a run of a particular type in a random process makes a reversion more likely – so a run of red on a roulette wheel makes black more likely next time.
Recency bias is derived from something called Bayesian inference defined as "the process by which the probability estimate for a hypothesis is updated as additional evidence is learned". If you bet, you use it all the time and probably do not know it.
In terms more familiar to the reader, the above definition of Bayesian inference might be stated as "the process by which our evaluation of a horse's/team's/ individual player's ability (or odds in a given context) gets revised as additional evidence is learned".
"Additional evidence" can be anything from a change in the going to an unexpected defeat, from the acquisition by a team of a valuable player to an unexpected victory, and much more besides. Often, the score is one of most misleading statisticss, which is good because this leads to over-reaction and hence value...
So how much should we revise our opinion of sports event upcoming as a result of this latest evidence?
It is impossible to be sure quite how big a part recency bias plays in distorting the betting market, but the suspicion is that it is plenty.
What you as a subscriber to Betting Emporium are doing is asking the writer to combine his thoughts on value, with his opinion of recency, and come to a conclusion. The weight he attaches to the two may vary according to his experience and the characteristics of each sport but in general (and generalisation is difficult in this area) we can see that the Betting Emporium approaches emphasise value over recency, and contrarian over momentum.
What's new on Betting Emporium?
English Football - Premier League Games Stuart analyses the week's games in the Premier League, free to access here
English Football - Championship GamesStuart analyses the week's games in the Championship, free to access here
English Non League Football - Conference Games - Alan analyses the week's games in the Conference, free to access here
Premier League Statistical Analysis – Four winning weeks from four for the Premier League Over 2.5 goals analysis so far this season. You can read this here still FREE to all registered users
Football by Brodders - across European leagues, and including Champions League analysis, is available here
