Weekly Articles "Road to Riches" by Rich 'Tighty' Prew
The Road to Riches Weekend of 2nd-3rd February
Coming up this weekend
- Football, Premier League fixtures include Manchester City v Arsenal
- NFL, the Superbowl
- Rugby Union, the first weekend of the Six Nations
- Racing, Over the jumps on Saturday at Musselburgh, Sandown and Wetherby. All weather racing at Kempton Park and Lingfield.
- Cricket, the second test between the West Indies and England in Antigua continues.
- Golf, the Saudi Open and on the USPGA the Waste Management Phoenix Open at Scottsdale
- Tennis, Davis Cup World Group Qualifiers
Superbowl LIII This Sunday by Neil Channing
The NFL Superbowl Package available now at £25 includes all the prop bets. If you signed up for the Playoffs you will automatically have access to this.
Sign up here
The Six Nations starts tonight!
To get all the Six Nations analysis, write ups and details of our bets it's £50 sign up here
Premier League Darts (Thursday 7th Feb-Thursday May 23rd)
Starting next week, Seventeen weeks of write ups and bets by Nigel Seeley for £50 sign up here
Free tip
Saturday 2nd February Big Bash Sydney Sixers v Sydney Thunder (Saturday 8am GMT)
The Sixers, led by the bowling attack of Abbott, Curran and O'Keefe with over 45 wickets between them in the competition this season have seven wins out of 12 and are in second place in the table and the most improved team in the competition this year headed into the last week of the group stages.. Their now vaunted bowling attack dismissed the Strikers for only 124-8 in the in last game.
For their four main bowlers the results this season, and 12 games in we are getting towards as meaningful a sample size as you can get for a single T20 tournament (this is a long tournaments, its been going two months and is still a fortnight away from finishing!) have been as follows
For the wicket taking fast-medium all rounder Abbott
43.1 overs bowled-350 runs conceded-18 wickets taken at a strike rate of 14.3
For Surrey’s Tom Curran effective death bowler full of variations 43.5-326-16 wickets SR 16.4
For the Slow left arm veteran spinner O’Keefe 45-343-17 wickets SR 15.8
Complemented by new ball bowler Dwarshuis 44.4 302-12 wickets SR 22.3
We can see this attack has depth but that Abbott has taken the most wickets at the lowest strike rate and should be outright favourite in the Sixers Top bowler market yet he is not, and therein lies the opportunity
10 points Sean Abbott Top Sydney Sixers bowler 3/1 William Hill and Bet365
From Zero to Hero?
The NFL off-season, which begins on Monday, is long which gives plenty of opportunity to assess which teams might rebound in the next regular season one of the beauties of the NFL being that the salary cap and free agency combine with the draft to make it possible to turn franchises round quickly, often accompanied by coaching changes. The Patriots buck the trend in the NFL, thanks to all time great coaching and quarterback play. For most other franchises, they deal in short windows to win
Two years ago the Eagles and Jaguars went from bottom of their division the year before to first. In the year just finishing, the Texans did the same and it is now 15 consecutive years that a team has achieved this. Of course, the odds are against most last-place teams, at least based on the past five seasons: 19 of the 40 last-place teams went on to finish in last place again, while just six managed to claim a division title but the betting opportunities are there if the right teams are identified as the turn-around stories are rarely factored into prices in advance.
So taking the 4th placed divisional finishers in alphabetical order
Arizona Cardinals (NFC West)
- One of the toughest divisions, have to overcome the Rams, Seahawks and the 49ers (with Garoppolo returning at QB)
- About to have their third head coach in three seasons
- Have the number one draft pick
- Potentially have a franchise quarterback from last year’s draft
- Should use star RB David Johnson better
- Have to significantly improve the offensive line to become competitive
Cincinnati Bengals (AFC North)
- A coaching change, but that new coach faces a tough task to overcome the franchise culture that underinvests in scouting and rarely spends in free agency
- Draft focus might be on quarterback but the defense needs significant work in the back seven, they were one of the weakest defensive teams
- There is offensive talent with running back Joe Mixon and at receiver A J Green
- The division might be winnable, the Steelers in transition for example but Cleveland are ahead in their race to competititveness
Detroit Lions (NFC North)
- Only won one game against a team with a winning record in 2018
- The offense needs fixing, Stafford threw for less than 200 yards per game last year, and a new offensive co-ordinator has been appointed
- The defense ranked 10th in 2018
- Have to beat a resurgent Bears team to win this division
Jacksonville Jaguars (AFC South)
- Get a quarterback!
- Defense ranked fifth in the league last year
- Offense ranked 31st and whether via the draft or free agency (Nick Foles) the new offensive co-ordinator needs players who can help to put up some points to give that defense a chance, and that process wilinvolve straightening out Fournette too
- The Colts had a massive turn-around in 2018 with good drafting and the return of Andrew Luck but this is a winnable division again if the Jags can become more balanced.
New York Giants (NFC East)
- Lost 8 games in 2018 by seven or less points
- Very even division, 8-9 wins usually has a team well in contention
- In Beckham, Barkley and Engram there is skill position talent to spare
- The key will be upgrading the pass rush after finishing tied for 30th in sacks and fortifying the offensive line further which might take two drafts
- A decision needs to be made on Eli Manning. The franchise passed on a quarterback in last year’s draft and are indicating they will stick with him again for this year.
New York Jets (AFC East)
- Can they overtake the Patriots in one year from where they are now?
- On the upside they might have a legitimate franchise quarterback in Darnold
- On the downside the roster needs a lot of work, Darnold neads weapons and a better offensive line
- The Jets are projected to have plenty of salary-cap space to use in free agency.
- If it goes right, they are a potential wild card candidatefor next year
Oakland Raiders (AFC West)
- Three first draft round draft picks will represent the start of the rebuilding process in the last year before the move to Vegas and both sides of the ball require strengthening
- Derek Carr finished last season with career highs in passing yards (4,049) and completion percentage (68.9) and with more talent around him the team should improve, but unlikely to be a one year process, or not enough to threaten the Chiefs and Chargers in another tough division.
- The un-fireable Gruden hasn’t always drafted well but the recruitment of Mayock as GM gives him a strong talent evaluator to help
Tampa Bay Buccaneers (NFC South)
- The offense is high powered and especially with more consistency from Winston (not a given) under new head coach Arians should be capable of putting up lots of points again
- The Bucs were -18 on turnovers in 2018 (Winston, and the defense not creating any) get that back to league averages and the win loss record improves
- The defense needs an influx of talent,particularly at pass rusher and fortunately that coincides with the depth and strength of the upcoming draft.
- Overcoming the Saints isn’t going to be easy but this franchise has some “easy wins” to make.
Brodders Football Analysis
Brodders subscribers enjoyed a profitable 2018, betting £10 a point on matches would have won you £4,600 and he has now four successive profitable years. Over five years Betting £10 a point you would be winning over £23,000 with a 3.03% ROI Sign up here
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.
Betting Emporium results
The detailed results page has been updated as have the spreadsheets with the detailed bets. They can be found by clicking RESULTS
If you bet £10 per point on every recommended bet since launch you would be winning + £44,319 All bets have an ROI +3.3%
A £4000 bank betting £10 a point on all selections would now be worth £48,319 a 1107% increase
The Road to Riches Weekend of 25th-27th January
Coming up this weekend
- Football, the FA Cup Fourth Round.
- Racing, Over the jumps on Saturday at Cheltenham, Doncaster and Uttoxeter. All weather racing at Lingfield and Chelmsford City.
- Cricket, the second test between the West Indies and England in Antigua next week and the 2018-19 Big Bash continues.
- Golf, the Omega Dubai Desert Classic and on the USPGA the Farmers Insurance Open at Torrey Pines
- Tennis, The final weekend of the Australian Open
Superbowl LIII Sunday 3rd February by Neil Channing
The NFL Superbowl Package available now at £25 here includes all the prop bets. If you signed up for the Playoffs you will automatically have access to this.
The Six Nations (1st Feb – 16th March)
I am pleased to be covering the Six Nations with a full package this year.
To get all the Six Nations analysis, write ups and details of our bets it's £50 sign up here
Premier League Darts (Thursday 7th Feb-Thursday May 23rd)
Seventeen weeks of write ups and bets by Nigel Seeley for £50 sign up here
Free tip
FA Cup Fourth Round Bristol City v Bolton Wanderers (Friday 7.45pm)
These two championship teams met in Bristol last week with the home team winning 2-1. Bristol City are seventh in the Championship and 1/2 to win again against opponents second bottom of the Championship who have severe off the field troubles including a players' strike in pre-season, a winding-up order narrowly avoided in September, rows over collapsed transfers and difficulties in paying the first-team squad their salaries in November and December. Monday’s home game with West Brom saw crowd protests. The team lost 2-0 against visitors of whom it was described “they were never out of second gear”.
Bolton have only won 5 of 28 league games this season and have only one win from their last 18 league games. but the statistic that interests me is that the side have only scored 18 goals in those 28 matches failing to score in 15 of them.
Bristol C are a competent Championship side unbeaten since 24th November and going into the match off four successive wins. Take Bristol C to win to Nil
10 Points Bristol C to win to Nil at 13/10 Bet365, BetVictor, Ladbrokes
E’s are good?
The fifth season of Formula E began in December with the third race of a thirteen race season this weekend in Santiago. Formula E is an attempt to recreate single-seater racing for the modern world moving away from internal combustion engine technology and acting as a forerunner of new technologies for the sport.
There are good things about Formula E. All the races in the 11-venue series are held on street circuits, as many as possible in “world cities” like Paris, Berlin, Rome and New York. Some circuits, such as Marrakech, Santiago and Sanya in China, are new to international single-seater racing. However the short tracks are bordered by high-safety fencing covered with sponsors’ logos; this makes everywhere look the same although it has the benefit of making the cars which are slow by F1 standards appear quicker than they really are.
The duration of each race is 45 minutes plus one lap, or less than half that of a grand prix, and the whole meeting including practice and qualifying sessions takes place in a single day.
On the technical side, the absence of complicated tyre regulations is a good way of differentiating itself from Formula One, which has bad tyres and worse rules. Formula E cars race on one standard all-weather tyre.
The new second-generation cars this season have attractive bodywork and more powerful batteries, meaning that the drivers no longer have to switch cars in mid-race. Battery technology continues to accelerate in a manner that serves the formula's justifiable claim as a cutting edge for the motor industry's future. Major manufacturers, including Audi, Jaguar, Nissan and BMW, are investing in the formula.
The Fan Boost feature, which allows watchers to give their favourite drivers an extra burst of power via online voting, is a that will always alienate purists but gives spectators and viewers a welcome engagement in their favourite driver.. New for this season is the Attack Mode, another extra temporary power-surge activated by swerving off the regular racing line on a specified section of track. Like F1’s DRS, it would seem unnecessary if the series had got its competitive balance right and early results have been less positive than Fan Boost.
Is Formula E a leader in the sport of motor racing? Not yet. Instead of attacking F1's many weaknesses, Formula E appears to be embracing Grand Prix racing's confused and complex structure by having cars removed to the back of the grid for opaque reasons. However it is a high profile look at the development of technology showcasing to the public that electric cars are going longer and are going faster every year
At least it’s better than the other 21st century alternative which has emerged in the last two years, sponsored by Formula one to attract a new younger audience, which is watching “drivers” playing on eSports simulators, competing for “championships” that exist outside any kind of reality.
Brodders Football Analysis
Brodders subscribers enjoyed a profitable 2018, betting £10 a point on matches would have won you £4,600 and he has now four successive profitable years. Over five years Betting £10 a point you would be winning over £23,000 with a 3.03% ROI Sign up here
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.
Betting Emporium results
The detailed results page has been updated as have the spreadsheets with the detailed bets. They can be found by clicking RESULTS
If you bet £10 per point on every recommended bet since launch you would be winning + £44,319 All bets have an ROI +3.3%
A £4000 bank betting £10 a point on all selections would now be worth £48,319 a 1107% increase
The Road to Riches Weekend of 19th-20th January
Coming up this weekend
- Football, Premier League matches include Arsenal v Chelsea.
- Racing, Over the jumps on Saturday at Ascot, Haydock and Taunton. All weather racing at Lingfield and Wolverhampton.
- NFL, Conference Championship weekend in the NFL Play-Offs
- Rugby Union, The final round of European Champions Cup Rugby Pool matches
- Cricket, the first test between the West Indies and England in Barbados next week and the 2018-19 Big Bash continues.
- Golf, the Abu Dhabi HSBC Championship and on the USPGA the Desert Classic
- Tennis, The Australian Open
NFL Play-Offs by Neil Channing
The NFL Play-Offs (Jan 5th-20th) Package available now at £50 here
The Six Nations (1st Feb – 16th March)
I am pleased to be covering the Six Nations with a full package this year.
To get all the Six Nations analysis, write ups and details of our bets it's £50 sign up here
Premier League Darts (Thursday 7th Feb-Thursday May 23rd)
Seventeen weeks of write ups and bets by Nigel Seeley for £50 sign up here
Free tip
European Rugby Champions Cup Pool 4 Saturday 3.15pm Leicester Tigers v Ulster
Ulster beat Racing 26-22 in Belfast last Saturday a key result to put them in pole position for a runners up spot (with Racing likely to beat Scarlets at home and therefore win the group) with the last round of pool stages matches taking place this weekend before the start of the Six Nations. For Ulster a first European quarter-final in four years is at stake. They who could still top their pool, claim a runners-up spot or miss out on the knockout stages entirely. As is usually the case in sport, the simple solution is to win.
In winger Jacob Stockdale they have the premier finisher in European rugby with six tries in five matches so far in this competition this season. With 4 wins out of five in the pool, the single loss coming in Paris, they should win here at Leicester who are in a long term transitional phase and with one win in five games in this competition this season have their thoughts elsewhere.
Leicester played much changed weakened team last weekend losing 33-10 at the Scarlets. Their priority now is their league form and a crucial run of matches without their international players during the six nations. Although their league form has picked up a little after a terrible start to the season the essential weaknesses in defense persist, as well as a lack of quality in the second and back row and although they have picked a stronger team here notably in the back division with May, Tuilagi, Ford and Youngs all starting (which has seen their point spread quote move from +4 to +2 on Friday morning and Ulster drift from 4/7 best) they are likely to be up against it against an Irish province with strength across the board.
Playing at Welford Road against this Leicester side is not the formidable proposition it once was – Racing beat them 34-11 in Leicester before Christmas - after which the Leicester coach described his club as “at its lowest ebb”.
I think Ulster (10/11 outright with Bet365) will be too strong despite the absence of Irish international lock Iain Henderson, highly motivated and will cover -2 at 10/11 available across the market. I like Ulster 1-12 in the region of 6/4+ specifically for this column.
10 points Ulster to win by 1-12 points 15/8 Betfair Sportsbook/Paddy Power, 7/4 Blacktype, 6/4 Ladbrokes/Coral
All change
Weeks after the £230m deal with CVC to inject new capital into English club rugby union, in which each of the Premiership clubs receives £18m, there are the first indications of how they see the English game being developed.
There is already talk of suspending relegation from the Premiership as early as this season which would be the first step towards creating a closed shop more common with American sports. Bernie Ecclestone in the Mail on Sunday two weeks ago commented “If you got hold of the guys and tarted them up, it would be bigger than American football.”
Clearly there is scope to improve how the club game is marketed and promoted, though whether there is a huge broadcasting rights deal to be done is an open question. Scrapping relegation the Championship mid-season would be counter-productive. What about those in the Championship who have invested in players with the intention of pushing for promotion this season or next? There is already understandable talk of legal action being taken by aggrieved Championship/second-tier clubs.
What happens thereafter, though? What does “tarting up” mean? The Premiership games played in the US for example to date haven’t engaged American sports fans. If an NFL franchise-based competition is the end game, it has to involve a proper draft system, a decent geographical spread and a centralised distribution of funds to ensure competitiveness top to bottom of the league. Instead if they were to look at the Premier League, of course promotion and relegation remain integral features of the model.
Ever since the RFU mistakenly failed to contract the top English players centrally at the outset of professionalism in 1996, the club versus country dynamic has been fraught. The big difference now is clubs are flush with new cash at a time when RFU budgets are under pressure and no permanent chief executive is in place at Twickenham.
It remains fanciful, nevertheless, to imagine a rebel league completely independent of RFU funding, full of players who have opted to turn their backs on representing their country. It would not surprise me if ultimately some kind of global conference system materialises with a world club final at the end of every season but how we get there likely to be a difficult process
Brodders Football Analysis
Brodders subscribers enjoyed a profitable 2018, betting £10 a point on matches would have won you £4,600 and he has now four successive profitable years. Over five years Betting £10 a point you would be winning over £23,000 with a 3.03% ROI Sign up here
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.
Betting Emporium results
The detailed results page has been updated as have the spreadsheets with the detailed bets. They can be found by clicking RESULTS
If you bet £10 per point on every recommended bet since launch you would be winning + £44,319 All bets have an ROI +3.3%
A £4000 bank betting £10 a point on all selections would now be worth £48,319 a 1107% increase
The Road to Riches Weekend of 12th-13th January
Coming up this weekend
- Football, Premier League matches include Tottenham v Manchester United.
- Racing, Over the jumps on Saturday at Kempton, Warwick and Wetherby. All weather racing at Kempton Park and Lingfield.
- NFL, Divisional Round Weekend in the NFL Play-Offs
- Rugby Union, European Champions Cup Rugby Pool matches
- Cricket, the 2018-19 Big Bash continues.
- Golf, on the USPGA the Song Open in Hawaii
- Tennis, ATP Opens in Sydney and Auckland ahead of the Australian Open
Australian Open Tennis
The Australian Open starts this weekend. Full package by Nigel Seeley available now at £50 here
If you had bet £10 a point (average bet 10 points) in last year’s event package you would have won £1,242 with a 58% ROI
NFL Play-Offs by Neil Channing
The NFL Play-Offs (Jan 5th-20th) Package available now at £50 here
The Six Nations (1st Feb – 16th March)
I am pleased to be covering the Six Nations with a full package this year.
To get all the Six Nations analysis, write ups and details of our bets it's £50 sign up here https://www.bettingemporium.com/tips/index/233
Free tip
European Rugby Champions Cup 3.15pm Saturday Pool 4 Ulster v Racing92
The key game in Pool 4 takes place in Belfast on Saturday. Our ante-post selection for the competition Racing lead the pool with four wins out of four games and are the notional number one seed for the knock out stages with two rounds of pool matches to go. Earlier in the pool Racing beat Ulster 44-12 in Paris but that was in very different conditions than we will get at Ravenhill in early January, as the stadiumat La Defense is an artificial pitch, indoors, condusive to flair and speed.
Ulster are second in the pool five points behind Racing with three wins and a draw from their four games and with a considerable home advantage with a passionate home crowd contributing. With only three runners up places available for the knock out stages from five pools it is important that Ulster at least get something out of this game. In this respect the opportunity for one attacking bonus point for scoring four or more tries in a match and one defensive bonus point for losing a match by seven points or fewer could be key and the same applies to Racing. Lose by less than a score and it could well be job done to secure the pool win with the Scarlets at home in their last match.
Outright prices here are Racing 4/6 Ulster 6/4+ and Racing -3 points on the spread. I think, notwithstanding their results so far that pricing up Racing as away favourites in Belfast is a tough optimistic. It should be very close but Ulster could well scrap their way to a narrow win and I like then at 8/5 with William Hill
10 points Ulster to win 8/5 William Hill 6/4 Ladbrokes, Betfred
A private revolution
A private revolution is taking place in the NFL around analytics, an area under-utilised in the sport compared to baseball in particular amongst the major American sports. The presence of younger General managers and coaches within teams is one of the reasons why but the spread of the NFL’s player-tracking data, which is being shared league-wide for the first time this season is the main reason. Having access to that data allows teams to build models to analyse plays and players differently.
From a situation where only a minority of the smartest teams had embraced analytics there is now an arms race across the league as average teams are trying to get better in this area. The aim is for teams to use the analytics to gain a competitive advantage in a league that is structured (via the draft and free agency) to prevent you from having that advantage.
Next Gen Stats,the NFL’s advanced player-tracking data service, began five years ago. Next Gen Stats collects information from chips placed in players’ shoulder pads that reveal their location at all times; the chip can track how fast a player is moving, whether he is sprinting or jogging, the average separation between an offensive player and his defender, and many other metrics. Some of this data is public but the vast majority is available only to teams, who are creating other proprietary stats from the raw numbers. NFL franchises are absorbing millions of data points for the first time and currently there appear to be inefficiencies in the interpretation of that data.
All teams have this information so the key is what they do with it, the way they use it. It’s no different than when we they go to the scouting combine and pro days and get all the same information. It’s about finding an advantage and angles that other teams miss.
As the NFL moves into the information age across the league rather than in a minority of franchises, there will be more data, larger sample sizes, more decisions made based on that data, and more evidence of what works.
Brodders Football Analysis
Brodders subscribers enjoyed a profitable 2018, betting £10 a point on matches would have won you £4,600 and he has now four successive profitable years. Over five years Betting £10 a point you would be winning over £23,000 with a 3.03% ROI Sign up here
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.
Betting Emporium results
The detailed results page has been updated as have the spreadsheets with the detailed bets. They can be found by clicking RESULTS
If you bet £10 per point on every recommended bet since launch you would be winning + £44,319 All bets have an ROI +3.3%
A £4000 bank betting £10 a point on all selections would now be worth £48,319 a 1107% increase
The Road to Riches Weekend of 5th-6th January
Coming up this weekend
- Football, FA Cup 3rd Round weekend.
- Racing, Over the jumps on Saturday at Newcastle, Sandown and Wincanton. All weather racing at Kempton Park and Lingfield.
- NFL, Wild Card Weekend as the NFL Play-Offs begin
- Cricket, the 2018-19 Big Bash continues.
Australian Open Tennis
The Australian Open (Jan 14th-27th) full package by Nigel Seeley available now at £50 here
If you had bet £10 a point (average bet 10 points) in last year’s event package you would have won £1,242 with a 58% ROI
NFL Play-Offs by Neil Channing
The NFL Play-Offs (Jan 5th-20th) Package available now at £50 with the Wild Card weekend and Superbowl market write ups live here
The Six Nations (1st Feb – 16th March)
I am pleased to be covering the Six Nations with a full package this year.
To get all the Six Nations analysis, write ups and details of our bets it's £50 sign up here
Free tip
FA Cup Third Round Accrington Stanley v Ipswich Town Saturday 3pm
In general these days the competition sees fewer upsets than previously. Pitches are better, squad depth in the top division is strong and the impact of inevitable rotation after the busy Christmas Period is limited. Last season did see some opportunities in sides from Leagues one and two playing Championship sides in the third round, with four wins and three draws amongst those ties.
This match sees a similar opportunity. Ipswich are bottom of the Championship having won two league games all season scoring 21 goals in 26 matches with no discernible improvement in form since the appointment of Paul Lambert in October. The squad desperately needs in investment in the transfer window upcoming. However that’s not an easy call for decade long owner Marcus Evans. Latest financial figures show that the club is £95m in debt to him, made a pre-tax loss of £5m last year and is experiencing higher wage bills and lower gate receipts. It looks likely that this will come to a head in relegation and then cutting the cloth accordingly with a restructuring of the club on the field.
A visit to Accrington for a struggling side isn’t that appetising a prospect at the compact Wham Stadium (yes, really) which holds 5,500. Accrington under John Coleman were promoted out of League two last season despite the joint lowest budget in the division and have established themselves in League One, just outside the top ten which of course is quite the over-achievement and testament to Coleman’s team building and eye for talent which typically needs replacing when several players are poached every summer.
With these two sides likely to be in the same division next season, and Ipswich really struggling this, this should be prime territory for an upset. You have to question Ipswich’s appetite for this game given their upcoming priorities
10 points Accrington Stanley to beat Ipswich Town 13/8 Bet365, BetVictor, Betfred
Deal or No Deal
The prospect of a “No Deal” Brexit on 29th March 2019 has implications for a number of sports besides football, which I have written about in this column. One of these is Northern Hemisphere club rugby.
The growing prospect of no deal has put the organisers of the Premiership, Pro14 and the European Champions Cup in a state of uncertainty with few definitive preparations for that eventuality.
Exiting without a deal would have an immediate impact on clubs. It would leave a divide among Ireland’s four provinces with Leinster, Munster and Connacht governed by European law and Ulster by British statute. That could impact on recruitment with players from South Africa, Fiji, Tonga and Samoa, who are currently classified as European because their countries have trade agreements with the EU, maintaining their status in the Republic of Ireland but not in Northern Ireland where they would fall under the foreign player rule. Pro 14 clubs for example are currently allowed only two non-Europeans in matchday squads for example.
A European player is defined as one who is a citizen of an EU member country. It would mean after Brexit that Welsh, Scottish, English and Northern Irish players who played in one of the other countries would technically be classified as a foreigner.
Beyond this season what happens is a matter for discussion, such as whether players who have qualified as “Europeans” will maintain that status or whether they will need a work permit.
A question for unions post-Brexit is whether to tighten up the rules on registration to increase the number of homegrown players in squads. It would affect England more than Wales and Scotland.
A club such as Gloucester that has recently signed a number of South African players could find they have to exclude all except two of them every weekend. Bristol, Newcastle and Northampton would be in the same position but Premiership Rugby would doubtless make representations to the RFU. Clubs feel they have the balance right between homegrown players and imports but with the salary cap being frozen for the next two seasons, wage increases will have to be balanced by either a reduction in squad sizes or the promotion of more academy products.
Brodders Football Analysis
Brodders subscribers enjoyed a profitable 2018, betting £10 a point on matches would have won you £4,600 and he has now four successive profitable years. Over five years Betting £10 a point you would be winning over £23,000 with a 3.03% ROI Sign up here
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.
Betting Emporium results
The detailed results page has been updated as have the spreadsheets with the detailed bets. They can be found by clicking RESULTS
If you bet £10 per point on every recommended bet since launch you would be winning + £44,319 All bets have an ROI +3.3%
A £4000 bank betting £10 a point on all selections would now be worth £48,319 a 1107% increase
