Fitness & Motivation - Betting in the final third

[Mindfulness]

First of all I should mention that I only bet on the asian handicap market but this thread could apply to 1X2 and possibly other soccer markets aswell. Personally I find betting in the final third of a football league campaign the most difficult. Once we’re into the month of March my betting frequency drops off completely and I effectively shutdown for the campaign. There are two main reasons for this: 1. Difficulty in assessing the relative fitness levels between any two sides. 2. Difficulty in assessing a teams psychology and motivation when a clear objective (title, european places, relegation battle) has effectively dissolved. Common sense suggests that pricing errors occur for the entire duration of a football season and so I believe there are decent betting opportunities to be had in the last third of any given campaign. The crucial thing for me is acknowledging that additional information needs to be factored in when considering bets in the last third of a season. I have started this thread in an attempt to figure out what form that additional information may take and how it can be applied to the decision making process. I’m really open to all suggestions and ideas here, whether it’s brainstorming or detailed analysis, I welcome all discussion on the subject. I will start with a couple of my own observations: Example 1: EPL 2013/2014 Looking at the English Premier League in 2013/2014 from a betting perspective, two of the most lucrative teams in the last third of the campaign would have been Stoke City and Crystal Palace. Stoke suffered only 2 league defeats from March onwards while Palace only suffered 3. The two sides were among the premier leagues most physically robust and industrious. Both sides made important additions in the January transfer window: Odemwingie for Stoke, Ledley and Ince for Crystal Palace. Aswell as both teams possessing a core of players that were physically strong and good in the air, both teams had pace and skill in wide areas that could stretch opposition teams and catch them out if they were tired. Both teams continually had very strong support from their respective home crowds – the twelfth man. As an interesting footnote both teams started their strong final third runs with confidence boosting home victories over strong opposition: Stoke beating Arsenal 1-0 on March 1^st, Palace beating Chelsea 1-0 on March 29^th. The characteristic parallels between the two teams are too numerous to be coincidental in my view. As I am writing this I am reminded of Varese’s Serie B playoff exploits of 2011/2012. They were a team of much smaller resources than their fellow promotion contenders but they defied the odds to make the 2011/2012 Serie B playoff final after performing well in the final third of the campaign. Varese were a strong and physically robust team, they played a 4-4-2 with classic wingers who were fast and direct. Coaching? Generally speaking I believe there is a noticeable variation in the effectiveness of individual coaches/managers fitness and endurance programmes. One possible avenue of inquiry could be to try and isolate the good fitness managers from the bad ones. The first name I will throw into the hat is Tony Pulis – he is really excellent when it comes to fitness and endurance programmes, we should expect any team he manages to have good physicality and fitness levels. Let’s see if we can find some more… Anyways I look forward to hearing other peoples thoughts and views on final third betting and hopefully we can continue to improve our profit margins as a result.

[Matthew]

Re: Fitness & Motivation - Betting in the final third Hi Das Phantom, An interesting train of thought. I find that my approaches in the year don't tend to drop off and I bet to the end of the season. I find the bookmakers adjust what they offer dramatically to account for public perception and team desperation to achieve a given result. You often see much longer odds on the better team just based on the fact they don't need the result and their opposition do. I'd factor in professionalism to your assessment, which may go hand in hand with fitness and endurance as a manager who focuses on those is probably more professional and demands a professional response from their players. Some managers won't do favours. Nor will they accept sub par performance just because a team is safe from relegation or having already secured a champions league/europa league place. What is it about your current betting that doesn't work in the final third? Why do your metrics start to not work at this time? Of course, this all needs to be quantified and assessed to understand the usefulness of any metric over many seasons/leagues. Do you have such metrics that show how your current betting doesn't work from March onwards?