MAFL 2010 : Round 11 Results

Absent an upset victory by either the Tigers or the Eagles - both of which outcomes seemed possible for at least a portion of their respective games - that was just about as good a weekend as Investors with the Recommended Portfolio might have hoped for.

An improbable Dogs victory also tantalised for a few minutes late in the final term on Friday, but that outcome ultimately proved unattainable, leaving the Recommended Portfolio up 2.4c on the weekend and down now just 11.1c on the season.

The portfolio of MIN#017 also finished in the black, though the 8.4c hike has left much still to do to return that Portfolio to parity, languishing as it does still some 37c down on the season. Still, how does one eat an elephant? The conventional answer is: one spoonful at a time.

MIN#002 was the only Investor to suffer losses this week. His portfolio fell 6.3c to 75.2c, a victim of Hope's curiously lacklustre performance so far this season, which has seen it land just 4 of 12 wagers.

Here's the detail.

Shadow lost money for the second week in row and so is now at risk of losing control of the Heuristic-Based Fund. Short-Term Memory I will assume control from Round 13 if Shadow loses money again in the next round and if the profitability of wagering on STM I's home team tips continues to be the highest amongst all the heuristic tipsters.

Speaking of heuristic tipsters, their overall tipping performance this week might best be described as adequate, with almost all tipping fewer than BKB's six. Ride Your Luck was the only tipster to match BKB, and Chi was the only tipster to outperform it. Chi tipped seven, but still remains a considerable distance from the lead bunch.

Easily Impressed I, which tipped just 4 from 8 this week, retains outright leadership on 61 from 88 (69%). Easily Impressed II is second on 60 and Short-Term Memory I is third on 59, each of them also tipping correctly in just 4 from 8 contests. These uninspiring performances have allowed BKB to narrow the gap so that it is now just 4 tips from joint-leadership.

MARS Ratings saw some jostling amongst positions 3 to 6, with St Kilda claiming third and Carlton fifth, dropping the Dogs into fourth and Freo into sixth. No other changes in ladder position occurred, a consequence of the weekend's generally close games in which no victory margin exceeded 41 points and in which six games were decided by margins of four goals or fewer.

Amongst the Margin Tippers, LAMP benefited most from the narrowness of victory margins since they most closely resembled its prediction. Its Mean APE for the round of just 14 points per game enabled it to lop 1.5 points off its season-long Mean APE, and the fact that none of its APE's for the round exceeded 27 points meant that it also lopped a stunning 7 points off its Median APE. This performance leaves LAMP third on Mean APE and has catapulted it into first on Median APE.

BKB retains overall leadership on Mean APE - though all but Chi have now joined BKB in having a sub-30 Mean APE -but it now finds itself third on Median APE, behind LAMP and ELO.

HELP recorded another unreportable set of results finishing with just 3 from 8 correct line picks and an overall sub-naive set of probability scores.

In aggregate, the weekend's matches produced just 173 goals and 171 behinds, comfortably the lowest total for each scoring type in a round this season. Though the weather could legitimately be cited as a contributory cause this week, the general inaccuracy in front of goal that saw almost as many goals scored as behinds has been a season-long phenomenon. To date, the season has seen 2,260 goals scored and 2,110 behinds - a conversion rate of just 51.7%, which is significantly below the long-term average. Only nine teams have a conversion rate above 50%, and seven of them are in the top eight. The exceptions are Hawthorn, who are eighth and have a 48.9% conversion rate, and Essendon, who are ninth and have a 51.8% conversion rate.