'Not so' Hidden Opportunities

Goals were hard to come by this weekend. Consequently, The Goal List probably made a fairly swift exit from some inexperienced trader's bookmarks tab, as they plod on in their search for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow. Although not without stopping to send me some abuse on Twitter first mind (haha).

Sure, on the face of it I suppose it was a bad weekend because there was a lack of goals. This is shown by the figures for straight backing over 3.5 and over 4.5 goals.

Over 3.5 goals made a loss of 1.2pts
Over 4.5 goals made a loss of 5.5pts

Panic stations...?!

No. This is hardly disasterous and both remain very nicely in profit over the long term (Over 3.5 = +23.9pts & Over 4.5 = +43.6pts). I wouldn't lose any sleep over a combined loss of 6.7pts when one or two nice wins would easily cover it.

The real point of this post is to highlight the fact that despite it being a poor weekend on the goal front there were still plenty of opportunities to profit from Goal List selections in play. Three matches in particular stand out.

1. Derby v Birmingham (3-2):
The match was 1-0 right up until 70 odd minutes. After a flurry of goals between 73 and 85 minutes it ended 3-2 to Derby. I wasn't watching the markets at the time but my guess would be that under 2.5 probably reached circa 1.15 whilst under 3.5 and under 4.5 would have almost certainly been matched for plenty of pennies at 1.01, which of course was duly gubbed!

2. Manchester United v QPR (3-1):
I was trading this one and used a strategy mentioned more than once already on this blog in it's short lifetime (hence 'not so' hidden opportunities). I layed under 2.5 goals at half time at circa 1.30 and when QPR took the lead on 52 minutes I was confident enough of another few goals to let it run and take full profit. The only small annoyance is that I didn't lay any of the under 3.5.

3. Levante v Barcelona (0-4):
Another game which was 0-0 at half time. Again, I wasn't trading last night but under 2.5 and under 3.5 goals would certainly have been attractive prices to lay at half time. The goals came on 47', 51', 57', 63' and the rest is history.

Of course, not every match on the Goal List will feature goals. Not every match that is 0-0 at HT will go onto be a goal-fest in the second half (see Swansea v Liverpool yesterday!) but there are ways of picking out these matches. These type of trades are low risk and they come about far more often than you'd think. An important conclusion to draw from the above examples is the fact that the time of goals is just as important as the number of goals in a match when it comes to these selections.

The point I think most novice (and even some more experienced) traders fail to grasp is that you DON'T need to trade everything under the sun. Or even every game on the Goal List. Wait for the opportunities to present themselves. This blog is designed to give you the bones. It's up to you to flesh it out with further research and your own approach.

Approaches to the Goal List: Part Two (IN PLAY)

A good first weekend for the Goal List to go live and hopefully you managed to use the approaches in my last post to make some nice profits. In this post I aim to give you some more ideas about how you can approach matches on the Goal List from an In Play perspective.

Lay the draw late on in matches:

Let’s be honest, laying the draw is where we all started out as sports traders. It was simple, there were plenty of opportunities and it worked… for a while. Unfortunately laying the draw pre match does not work anymore, at least not in the way it used to. Some still think it does and use it regularly but in my opinion, these traders are living in the past and showing an astonishing lack of imagination.

What does work is laying the draw in play at ‘knock down’ prices. And for the purposes of the Goal List this can be a valuable weapon!

Take this weekend’s match between Millwall and (Dirty) Leeds. The game was 0-0 at Half Time and in the 47^th minute Luke Varney was sent off for Leeds. Despite the game not going entirely as we expected in the first half, the home side now had a man advantage and a quick glance at ‘Soccerway’ showed us two important statistics:

• The LAST goal in Leeds’ eight away matches this season has been scored in the following minutes: 80, 73, 77, 90, 79, 77, 66 and 83.

• Millwall have scored 12 goals in their last five home games.

Of course, another quick look at the Goal List statistics page shows that 97.7% of Goal List matches have at least one goal.

Personally I used this information to lay the draw at around evens and waited patiently for the goal. Thankfully it came in the 85^th minute and the profit was in the bank.

With the correct information and the accurate expectancy of goals in a match, laying the draw late on in Goal List matches which are 0-0 or even 1-1 late on is a no brainer for me. Of course I would always suggest looking for extra statistics to further back up your decision.

*to play this in a more conservative fashion why not look to lay the draw at Half Time and green up after the first goal in the second half.

Other in play approaches:

Lay the draw in the Half Time market:

Look at the statistics page. 143 of the 175 matches to feature on the Goal List have seen a goal scored in the first half. A bit of deeper analysis and some in play stats from the first 15-20 minutes of a match are a bonus. Then simply lay the draw in the HT market, or even lay 0-0 in the HT correct score market. If a goal goes in before Half Time, you my friend are a winner.

Back over 1.5 goals at Half Time:

In my last post ‘Approaches to the Goal List Part One’ I explained the approach of laying under 2.5 or 3.5 goals at Half Time. Well this is very similar. Again it is important to use in play statistics from the first half to aid your decision. So far 87.4% of Goal List matches have seen at least two goals. Use this information to your advantage.

Hopefully this has given you some more food for thought about how you can profit from the Goal List. It is important to note that blindly picking one of these approaches and applying it to all the matches would be lazy and probably an unproductive way to spend your time. Put a bit of science into it, follow the statistics and use a sensible staking plan and I’m sure you’ll come up smiling.

On a seperate note I have been pleasantly surprised at the response this blog and the Goal List selections have received and since going live last week it has had well over 3000 views. I am also encouraged by the fact that many are already looking at creating fresh trading strategies off the back of the Goal List picks and look forward to discussing more different approaches in the coming months.

Approaches to the Goal List: Part One

Over the next few weeks I will make a series of posts analysing the results of the matches I have traded using the Goal List so far and expanding on the ways in which you can use the Goal List selections to make a long term profit. For the purposes of this post I just want to introduce a couple of methods which might give you some food for thought on how you might like to use the Goal List picks. They can be broadly divided into two categories: Pre match and in play.

Pre Match:

Straight betting singles:

After some initial testing of the early selections I was particularly interested in the over/under markets. The most interesting thing for me is the difference in percentage of games which have gone over 2.5 to those that have gone over 3.5.

As it stands, 93/151 (61.5%) of matches have seen over 2.5 goals, whereas 64/151 (42.3%) have seen over 3.5 goals.

Most of the matches are expected to have 'some' goals and consequently the over 2.5 price can be as low as 1.50 (usually between 1.55 and 1.80). This is of little interest as far as making a profit is concerned.

Of more interest are the over 3.5 and over 4.5 goals markets. In fact the average price of over 3.5 goals on the 151 goal list selections to date is (circa) 2.70. Clearly an attractive price when you can hit it 42.3% of the time.

From the data I have gathered so far, backing over 3.5 goals in each of the 151 matches (6 weeks) so far would have yielded 20.5 pts profit. Backing over 4.5 goals would have returned an even more impressive 41pts profit.

In Play:

Trust that goals will arrive:

As most readers will be aware, you can get some great value in play as long as you know what you are expecting from a particular football match. In the case of the Goal List we are (obviously) expecting goals. We can take advantage of the in play markets and make huge gains. With a bit of extra research we will be laughing all the way to the bank!

The best way to explain this is by using a recent example:

West Ham v Southampton (4-1) - 20th October 2012

Expected to be a tight match of course and a quick bit of pre match research told us that 80% of Southampton's goals this season have come in the second half. The game was 0-0 at half time but we are now loaded with 3 important bits of information.

1. It qualified as a goal list selection (therefore we are expecting plenty of goals)
2. Southampton score 80% of their goals in second half
3. Crucially, we now have the in play stats from the first half, shots on target, chances, corners etc etc.

Decision? lay all the unders you can! - Personally I went for u2.5 and u3.5 goals at very short prices so a huge upside (desirable in trading).

Sure enough the first goal came in the 46th minute, the second on 48 mins and the third in the 63rd minute. From then on we had plenty of options. All of which ended in a very nice profit.

Of course not all games pan out as perfectly as this one but there are plenty of opportunities to be found in play.

Recent fixtures to feature on 'The Goal List'

To give you an idea of the kind of results and accuracy of 'The Goal List' selection process, here are the highlights from the month prior to the launch of this blog. Of course some of the fixtures would have been expected to feature goals but the fact is these fixtures are still very profitable if we use deeper analysis and the right approach to our tardes.

Between 19th October and 11th November, these were some of 'The Goal List' highlights:

*During this period there were 106 qualifying selections available on 17 days = Average of 6 selections a day. Although they were obviously weighted to weekends when there are more fixtures.*

19th October:
Singapore Armed Forces v Tampines Rovers (2-3)
JJK v Jaro (4-2)
Genclerbirligi v Galatasaray (3-3)

20th October:
Man United v Stoke (4-2)
West Ham v Southampton (4-1)
Valencia v Bilbao (3-2)
Kawasaki v Gamba Osaka (2-3)
Heracles v Ajax (3-3)

21st October:
Genoa v Roma (2-4)
Espanyol v Rayo (3-2)
VVV v Feyenord (2-3)

22nd October:
Singapore Armed Forces v Gombak (6-1)
Fredrikstad v Brann (3-4)

23rd October:
Bristol City v Burnley (3-4)
Blackpool v Nottingham Forest (2-2)

26th October:
Motherwell v Hibernian (0-4)

27th October:
Reading v Fulham (3-3)
Millwall v Huddersfield (4-0)
Carlisle v Bournemouth (2-4)
Kashiwa v Omiya (1-4)
JJK v HJK (3-6)

28th October:
Everton v Liverpool (2-2)
Varmano v Umea (5-0)

29th October:
Brann v Lillestrom (2-3)
Landskrona v Jonkopings (3-2)

2nd November:
Oss v Veendam (2-3)
Fredrikstad v Odd Grenland (4-2)

3rd November:
Hoffenheim v Schalke (3-2)

4th November:
Lillestrom v Stabaek (6-0)

6th November:
Crystal Palace v Ipswich (5-0)

7th November:
Kashiwa v Gamba Osaka (2-2)

9th November:
FC Eindhoven v Go Ahead Eagles (1-4)

10th November:
Arsenal v Fulham (3-3)
Leeds v Watford (1-6)
Stevenage v Preston (1-4)
Aston Villa v Man United (2-3)

11th November:
Mallorca v Barcelona (2-4)
OB v SonderjyskE (5-0)