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msudogs
Moderator
Registered: Nov 2005
Posts: 65535
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The last team to win a Premier League and FA Cup double was Carlo Ancelotti’s Chelsea in 2009-10. Antonio Conte would want us to believe that if his team achieve the double by winning the FA Cup final on Saturday, it would be a different kind of double. He believes that this Chelsea team, that has so dominated the league campaign and won last seven fixtures in all competitions, are a team in transition unlike the finished product that Ancelotti was managing seven years back. It is quite ominous, if what he believes is true. If this is transition, what would the finished team look and perform like? Standing in the way of his team achieving the double is Arsenal, who have won the cup twice in last three years, albeit while facing relegation threatened or relegated teams in both the finals.
Conte’s Chelsea face Arsenal for whom, the FA Cup presents the last glimmer of hope in a disappointing league season, which saw them finish outside the top four for the first time after 20 years. Like always, they had a late rally in the league campaign and won the last five matches but they still could not make it to the top four. Arsene Wenger adopted a three-man defence to overcome his team’s defensive problems and the change paid off but in the final he faces a selection dilemma as he might not have enough fit or eligible central defenders to play on Saturday. The other sword hanging on his head is one wielded by the angry supporters of Gunners who think that making a change of manager might improve their team’s performance in the Premier and Champions Leagues. It is now public knowledge that Wenger’s future will be decided after the final and that means that how his depleted team performs on Saturday will have a say in his future at Emirates. Talk about pressure.
Chelsea face no such pressure. They have won the league at a canter and they easily brushed off all the opposition on their road to Wembley. Even the only team that looked like challenging them – Tottenham were easily dealt with in the semifinal. Conte does not have any major selection conundrums and the only pressure Chelsea are under is that of the favourites tag. That, and the pressure on Conte to match the feat of Ancelotti’s side from seven years back.
Arsenal are in a defensive crisis of sorts. Lauent Koscielny got himself suspended for the final by earning a straight red card against Everton last Sunday. Gabriel Paulista remains sidelined with an injury and Shkodran Mustafi is also a doubt with a suspected concussion. Per Mertesacker should be available but he has too few minutes under his belt this season. The injury worries for Wenger are not limited to the defence as his wingers Gibbs and Oxlade-Chamberlain are both to be assessed at the time of kickoff to decide if they should start or not.
Chelsea have won their last seven competitive fixtures and the title winners will be brimming with confidence coming into Saturday’s final. They have won three of the last four meetings between these two sides, with the sole defeat coming at the Emirates back in September that prompted Antonio Conte to revert to a back three..
The Verdict
It was Arsenal that dealt Chelsea their heaviest defeat of the league campaign. That defeat led Conte to change his tactics and the Blues have not looked back since then. It is tempting to think that Arsenal have it in them to come up with a fiery performance in the final and that Wenger will continue at Emirates because of it. But the fact is that Chelsea have too much quality in that team and are playing a tactic that they have perfected throughout the season. They should win the final without too much difficulty.
Arsenal 1 – 2 Chelsea
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05-27-17 09:48 AM |
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msudogs
Moderator
Registered: Nov 2005
Posts: 65535
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Premier League betting can be affected by numerous different factors. Pundits claim playing in the FA Cup and pursuing the dream of winning a trophy could be one such factor. Open to all clubs in the English league system, the FA Cup is the oldest soccer competition in the world. The knockout format used means underdogs can beat teams several places, or even leagues, above them in a one-off game.
It may be a prestigious competition, but a decent cup run is sometimes seen as a distraction that burdens teams with extra fatigue that they then have to deal with in league matches. So does progressing in the cup negatively impact a team’s Premier League betting odds? Does being eliminated early mean a team can focus on the league and offer bettors value?
In the 2016 FA Cup final, Manchester United defeated Crystal Palace. Before their first FA Cup game on January 9, Manchester United were in 5th position and averaging 1.65 points per game (PPG) in the Premier League. At the end of the season, they finished 5th and averaged 1.83 PPG from January 9 onwards.
Crystal Palace, however, fell from 7th in the league and 1.55 PPG before their first FA Cup game to a 15th placed finish and a 0.61 PPG average at the end of the season. The negative impact of progressing in the FA Cup is highlighted further by the fact that they only managed to win 2 of the 18 EPL games they played after their FA Cup journey began.
The beaten 2016 FA Cup semi-finalists - Watford and Everton - faced a similar struggle to Crystal Palace. Everton’s 11th placed league position didn’t change, but they went from an average of 1.37 PPG to 1.10. Watford fell from 9th to 13th whilst playing in the FA Cup and their PPG average dropped from 1.45 to 0.88.
It would appear there is a mixture of results in terms of how success in the FA Cup impacts performance in the league. The likes of Arsenal and Sheffield United - playing in League One at the time - enjoyed a marked improvement in terms of PPG but overall, success in the FA Cup had a negative effect on these teams.
Out of the 12 teams to reach the semi-final or further in the last three years, seven saw a decline in their average PPG in the league. There is an average -0.06 PPG differential from when team’s started the FA Cup compared to the end of the season - something that should be considered by anyone looking for value in Premier League betting odds.
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05-27-17 11:23 AM |
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msudogs
Moderator
Registered: Nov 2005
Posts: 65535
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The persuasiveness and longevity of widespread perceptions in the world of soccer usually comes down to some cognitive bias that tends to cloud our judgement.
Recency or availability bias, for example, is the case where an occurrence from the recent past (such as a side scoring over three goals) is considered to be far more likely than what it actually is. Or confirmation bias, where isolated examples are sought to support a pre-conceived notion, such as a red-carded team winning despite having one fewer player.
It is therefore important when making betting decisions that we make some data-driven checks, rather than relying on our own often flawed intuition. With soccer bettors often assuming that 2-1 is the most likely lead to be overturned, do statistics support this idea? Let’s find out.
Examining comebacks in the Premier League
From a single recent Premier League season, 132 of the 380 matches at one point reached the stage where one team held a 2-1 lead.
On 74 of those occasions it was the home team who led, whilst 58 times it was the visitor - 89 times the third goal broke a 1-1 deadlock and in 43 matches the third goal was scored by a side that was trailing 2-0.
Out of 132 matches that reached 2-1 in a Premier League sample, 101 of the leaders eventually won the match, 25 drew and 6 lost.
16 minutes was the quickest it took to reach a 2-1, while the fourth minute of injury time was the latest arrival of the same scoreline. The average time when the score became 2-1 was a shade over 60 minutes.
The average abilities of the leading or trailing sides were broadly similar across the 132 matches.
The commonest method used to model the outcome of a game or the remainder of a match is based on the Poisson distribution.
A goal-based assessment is made about the relative abilities of the competing teams and the probabilities of subsequent results can then be made by estimating the likelihood that each team will score or concede a particular number of goals.
Putting the 2-1 scoreline to the test
We can model the remaining minutes of all 132 games from the point at which 2-1 was achieved and compare the resultant probabilities to those available in running to see if there is a broad agreement between model and layer.
However, a less labour-intensive approach which would yield similarly informative results would be useful in comparing a Poisson generated estimate, using the average time and relative qualities of the teams when they reached 2-1, in relation to the average outcomes across a season from the perspective of the side who led.
If we use the Poisson model to determine the final outcome of a slightly superior team - in order to allow for the slight preponderance of home teams who lead 2-1 after an hours play - we predict that the leading side wins 75% of the time, draws 20% and their lead is ultimately overturned in the remaining 5% of occasions.
By comparison, out of the 132 matches that reached 2-1 in my Premier League sample, 101 of the leaders eventually won the match, 25 drew and just 6 lost.
These convert to win, draw and loss percentages respectively of 76%, 19% and 5%, very nearly a perfect match to the modelled percentages.
This strongly suggests that tempting though it may be to intuitively see a 2-1 lead as very vulnerable - particularly in view of the still often quoted but now discredited reputation afforded to the 2-0 scoreline - it is very likely that any market inefficiencies associated with this particular scoreline will be rare.
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05-27-17 02:54 PM |
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