2013 : Round 18 - Wagers & Tips

After its four-bet flurry of last week, the Head-to-Head Fund has returned to the strategy it deployed for the five rounds prior, venturing just a single wager on an underdog. This time it's on the Dees who, I must admit, do seem generously priced at $17 taking on the seemingly win-averse Roos.

One aspect of this clash that weighs against the Dees is that they, though notionally enjoying home team status, find themselves playing at a venue they've trodden on a dozen times fewer than have their opponents over the course of the last 12 months. Such is the weirdness of the AFL draw.

In other wagering news for Investors, five teams have garnered the attention of the Line Fund, all of them favourites and, consequently, giving starts, which range from about 2.5 to about 14 goals. The Margin Fund shares the Line Fund's enthusiasm about those same five teams, albeit often for victory margins incompatible with securing collects for both Funds.

For the first time since Round 11, Investors have Friday night off. They're also financially disinterested in two more of the round's offerings, in one game on Saturday and in another on Sunday.

A Dees upset win over the Roos would deliver the round's best single-game return, bolstering the Recommended Portfolio by 6c, whilst favourable results for Geelong, Fremantle, Port Adelaide or Sydney would be next best, each promising upsides of a little over 3c. Unfavourable results for these same four teams and for Collingwood represent the round's worst results, each threatening to strip about 3c from the Recommended Portfolio.

The only game with a wager and a benign downside is the Dees v Roos clash, where a Roos win would knock just 0.4c off the price of the Recommended Portfolio.

TIPSTERS & PREDICTORS

In only three games this week do more than a pair of Head-to-Head Tipsters differ about their opinion of the more likely winner. For Friday night's Essendon v Hawthorn clash, and for Saturday's Fremantle v Adelaide matchup, there are four contrarians, while for the Dogs v Eagles game disagreement is maximal, with six Tipsters siding with the underdogs.

The Margin Predictors, however, are unanimous in their support for the favourites in every game, their disagreement instead focussed on the predicted size of the favourite's victory. Quantitatively, that disagreement is greatest in relation to the size of the Roos' defeat of the Dees, and the Pies' defeat of the Giants.

Amongst the Head-to-Head Probability Predictors there's also complete agreement about which team will win and only debate about the likelihood of those results. Maximal disagreement here has been generated by the Essendon v Hawthorn, Melbourne v Kangaroos, Bulldogs v Eagles, and Fremantle v Adelaide games, where probability assessments differ by roughly 20 percentage points or more. In WinPred's case, that disagreement has been almost enough to see it install the Dons as favourites against the Hawks.

Just three teams have been assessed by the Line Fund algorithm as being worthy of probability assessments on line betting of greater than 60% - the Pies, Port Adelaide, and Sydney, all of which are home teams and therefore candidates for wagers.