Selling Corners

[macbeth9]

I've spent a lot of time over the last couple of years looking at corners, to play on spreads or occasionally the under/over markets when available. It began when I noticed how restrictive it seemed to be on corners for a side playing 3-5-2 or with a single forward. The issue seemed to be the angle that centres came in at. A team playing without wingers seemed to have an inclination to hit crosses from deeper than those with wingers who were encouraged to get to the corner flags. Defenders instinct is to head crosses back in the direction they have come from. If they come from a corner flag then any misjudgement means a higher chance of a corner being conceded. Crosses from closer to the half way line are far less likely to end up going behind for a corner. This started me trying to spot sides who prefered to play deep, or without wingers. At the time I began this the biggest 'culprits' were Villa and Liverpool. I made some modest amounts goind low on corners. The next thing I noticed was in respect to the standard of games being played. The higher the level the less corners (generally) there seemed to be. If it was a European or international game the quality of all players was increased. This meant that a side was less likely to lump the ball forward, and would play possession football for a greater proportion of the game than 'normal'. This was highlighted a couple of years ago when Liverpool hosted Barca in a European game. Liverpool played their usual tight game, with no width, Barca played keepball. Just on half time a Barca shot from 30 yards was tipped away to give the first corner. The game ended with 4 in total (I think), Through last season I began to take more notice, keeping records of times of corners, what caused the corner etc. I'm amused at the way I now know instinctively whether a corner is due, its roughly every 9 miinutes. In each game there really is an amount of corners that come from daft mistakes, be it a back pass from the half way line, a blind official, or a defender trying to be clever. These just have to be accepted as noise. There is also the corner producing a second (and third) corner, which is hard to cope with. What did become clear was that the last 5-10 minutes often had more corners than a simple spread would expect. This came from losing sides trying something desperate. This was most pronounced in cup games, or games that mattered. The Liverpool-Arsenal game last spring had something like 3 in the last 5 minutes after 5 in the previous 85. The higher level of games seemed to become ever more significant, as did whether the game was a game that had to be won by one side or the other. The Rangers and Celtic games on the final day of last season were must-wins for them and they went for it and the corner count was high. The other side of this is games that don't need to be won. So for example the Real Madrid-Man U first leg in the spring was important to both sides, but at the end it woudl still only be half time. There was no need for either side to go mad, and they didn't ending up with 4 corners in total (including a last minute one). The ultimate dead games are interntaional friendlies. No one is going to bust a gut, and rhythm to the game is limited due to the number of subs. This meant all Scotlands spring friendlies and this season's against Norway made up very low. Similarly with most of England's. The theory is fine, but I found I needed to watch up to ten minutes to assure myself that things were as they seemed. This was particularly useful in the AC-Inter CL semi. I'd expected the first leg to be tight, and therefore for corners to be tight too. It was plain after a few minutes that AC were playing the ball into the corners and getting Schevchenko to force things. The game ended up with 14, and I'd not been caught out. The second semi had an initial spread of 10-11 and mad eup at 17, as the same tactics were emplotyed by the sides. If the first ten minutes (it may be only 5 if things look very positive) look as though they agree with the few corners criteria then I will sell. The problem then is to make sure I close out at the right time. Absolutely the limit should be the 80th minute as the last ten are so unpredictable. I generally will be happy to take a 3 to 4 point profit. This season I've made selling on the Charity Shield (teams not busting a gut in the heat), Ireland v Australia (international friendly), Norway v Scotland (international friendly), England v Serbia (ditto), Milan v Porto (essentially a friendly). I'll let you know how I get on in the future and try and highlight games I'll be taking an interest in.

[Joe]

Re: Selling Corners Excellent first post. More of this sort of game analysis would be a welcome thing. :)