Rugby - Scotland v Ireland (11th Aug)

[Wumpking]

Scotland take on Ireland in the next of the northern hemisphere's warm up games for RWC 07 on Saturday 11th August (2:30pm BST). The sides selected are: Scotland: R Lamont, S Lamont, Dewey, Henderson, Webster, Paterson, Blair, Jacobsen, Ford, Murray, Hines, Hamilton, White (capt), Hogg, Taylor Replacements: Thomson, Smith, MacLeod, Brown, Cusiter, Parks, Southwell Ireland: Murphy, Carney, O'Driscoll (capt), Duffy, Bowe, Wallace, Boss, Young, Flannery, S Best, O'Connell, O'Kelly, N Best, Ferris, Heaslip Replacements: R Best, Hayes, Quinlan, Gleeson, Reddan, O'Gara, Horgan Scottish side seems strong with the return of several key players. Patterson's selection at 10 also interesting. Irish side contains many of the players who toured Argentina during summer plus a few first 'teamers'. Carney on the wing also interesting. Scotland (11th - 73.94) are curently several places lower than Ireland (5th - 82.52) on the IRB rankings. The IRB 'handicap' home sides by treating them as being 3 points stronger than their current rating. If we assume this equates to the traditional 6/7 points home advantage is considered to be then Scotland, in theory, should lose to Ireland by 11-13 points. No prices available as yet. Based purely on the ratings, prices would probably be somewhere in the region of: Scotland @ 5.00 Ireland @ 1.20 Draw @ 30.0 Which equates to 107% market. Again, based purely on the ratings, the handicaps would probably be somewhere in the region of Ireland with a -14 point start @ 1.90. However, team strengths will no doubt play a part here in influencing the price / handicap as in effect it is almost a Scottish 1st XV v nearly a Irish 2nd XV. Even taking this into account, I would still consider Ireland to be favourites and would price the game somewhere in the region of: Scotland @ 2.20 Ireland @ 1.70 Draw @ 30.0 Lets see what the bookies have to say over the next few days before considering if any value to be obtained in betting on this fixture.

[AJ]

Re: Rugby - Scotland v Ireland (11th Aug) Nice writeup Wumpking :ok