2026 - Round 25 (Finals Week 1) : The First Wildcards

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This week we have the competition’s first-ever wildcard finals, a concept of which I’m not a fan. If about 56% of your teams are participating in your Finals series, I think you need to ponder harder on what you want winning the competition to mean.

The two wildcard games do look as though they’ll be close, but that’s something you should probably expect when only tams from 6th to 10th on the competition ladder are playing.

In the first game, the Pies are half-point favourites against the Dogs, the latter of which are the notional home team despite being forced to play at their opponent’s home ground. In the second, the Blues are two-and-a-half point favourites over the Dees.

TIPS AND PREDICTIONS

Contrarian tips are everywhere you look this week, with Home Sweet Home and Consult the Ladder tipping the underdogs in both games, and RSMP_Simple, MsSHBODS_Marg, and MARS_Marg doing the same in one.

Amongst the Margin Predictors the forecast ranges are 10 points for the Dogs v Pies game, and 11 points for the Dees v Blues game.

ENS_Linear is Extreme Predictor in both games, and Bookie_9 and MoSHBODS_Marg in one each.

Amongst the Head-to-Head Probability Predictors, the forecast ranges are 9 percentage points for the Dogs v Pies game, and 8 percentage points for the Dees v Blues game.

Bookie_RE, Bookie_LPSO, MoSHBODS_Prob, and MARS_Prob are the Extreme Predictors in one game each this week.






WAGERS

Just two wagers this week, both on Melbourne and both just over 2% of the respective Funds.

(Please click on the image below to access a larger version.)

The maths are as follows:

  • Melbourne wins: 2.3% x 25% x 1.02 + 2.2% x 65% x 0.9 = +1.9c

  • Melbourne loses by 1 or 2 points: -2.3% x 25% + 2.2% x 65% x 0.9 = +0.7c

  • Otherwise: -2.3% x 25% - 2.2% x 65% = -2c

So, best case is an increase in the price of the Combined Portfolio by just under 2c, worst case a decrease by 2c.

To finish, here are MoSHBODS’ and MARS’ opinions about likely team scoring, margins and probabilities.

Commentary about the MoSHBODS’ Totals forecasts will come in the week's Overs/Unders blog and MoSHPlay’s various forecasts will be posted after the relevant team line-ups are made public.