City are massive favorites for me, but I am enjoying our progress and what now appears to be a recent stability in some of our performances. It might make a difference not having to come from behind and controlling games.
EPL Title Race 20/21
- Thread starter horsechoker
- Start date
Nah we're only a couple of weeks behind a normal season, we're only 3 games from having played everyone
You have normally played 16 games by early December.
This year quite a few sides have only played 15, with a couple on 14!
Some teams are behind yeah but last season game week 19 fell on Boxing Day. This past weekend was gameweek 17
Beat Liverpool and I don't think I'll be able to stop myself getting excited. Only City seem to be putting a run together at the minute.
It's time.
I have resisted picking Fernandes for my FF team but now he's in and he's captain. And I will keep him my captain for 5 games. It's the only way.
Sorry Redcafers but you did this to me.
We actually struggled against teams that sit deep. Chelsea was coward playing against us played 5 defenders formation and decided to sit deep against us, he didn’t play 5 defenders against City, Liverpool and Spurs. I’m more surprised on Pep 0-0 vs us, I couldn’t believe how cautious his approach was and playing 2 DM (Fernandinho and Rodri) as well. Pep didn’t play 2 DM vs Chelsea & you guys Liverpool. It seems the top teams are so scared with our counter attack this season, can’t blame them since last season Ole beats Lampard 3x and Pep 3x.
Knowing Klopp, I don’t think Klopp will do Pep & Frank did against us this season, I think Klopp is willing to be more open in this game (hope I’m right). And that’s where you will see us performing against top teams. I’m excited for this match because we might finally able to play Bruno, Rashford & Martial together, last season both of the games we played, we were only able to play one of them.
Wow, you did well to avoid putting him in for the last 11 months! He’s a points machine!
Chelsea and City did surprise me with how they set up at old trafford but then it just shows both Lampard and Pep have been stung by the recent defeats to us and didn’t want to get killed by the counter attack again. Pep playing his 2 DMs for a full game was very surprising. I think he was happy to take a draw before the game started.
Thank you, @Rozay! But could you “like” it to make your praise count?
I’m afraid I don’t know how to
Last season week 17, Liverpool were on 49 points. Fair to say their injuries are now hurting them.
the article is nice but over-simple in term of data analysis. It’s better if the author can data mining some more insightful discovery if he has more comprehensive dataset.
However, the author did bring up a very interesting and meaningful hypothesis, empty stadium results in better communication between players and coaches because the voices can be heard clearly. We can further reasoning that this could bridge the gaps between top and lesser teams due to the difference quality level of individuals.
The author also directly provided the data which shows away win ratio throughout the league since no fans has increased from 20+ to 40+% in premier league. So, if many teams are getting better away results, why do we worry about our away games against the so-called top six? After so many games since the project restart, I guess every team has already be familiar with playing in an empty stadium. I imagine it is more like the experience of close-door friendly, training matches, warm up matches, and etc, but there are echos in empty stadium.
One more thing about the concern of our home results against title rivals. I think they shouldn’t be read too much. In fact, especially, those draws are good results. In the big pictures, by now, we are doing great against those teams we have always struggled, some have been the case even in SAF era, like Everton, Southampton, wolf, westham, and so on. Hope we can win against burley who is another one. The thing is that many of those traditional tough opponents have been getting points from our rivals. So, what really matters is that we can continue to get the results sometimes grind out the results.
Last edited:
they do adjust based on bet placed. In an extremely simplified example, assuming a bet is designed for binary outcomes, W (win) or L (loss). At the beginning of bet open, bookmaker will use historical data (maybe also combined from forward expectation inferred from the other data) to decide an initial odd.
Now, person A places X amounts on W. If the bet is closed now (or, no one bets on it anymore until expiration) and the outcome is L, bookmaker profits. If the outcome is W, they are surely lose money. Things like this are the situation they could lose money, and it is a liquidity issue.
If Person B also places a bet but on L for Y amount, bookmaker will now adjust the odd to be Y/X, of course in practice, they will add a margin/spread for profit. This of course can be corrected with the other inference method a little bit. But the main idea is that the win/loss is put on the gamblers. Thus, bookmaker is definitely risk free. This is also why they are called book-maker, similar to market-maker in exchanges of financial market. In financial industry, depending on context, people normally call it hedging, rebalancing book, risk controls, and etc.
The real world is definitely more complicated than the extremely simplied example above, because the bets comes in anytime before expiration. So, based on the same principle, they will have dynamic odd changing algorithm to handle the nature of time series.
Of course, the concern is the odd is changed mainly based on the information known at the odd changing time but used for future bets. However, if delta t is small enough to change the odd sequentially, it is not a problem when the liquidity is good.
You mean to try to jinx it?
I don't wish to get too excited, but.....If we beat Burnley we go into the Liverpool game 3 clear, say we win that we're then 6 clear and then play Fulham 24hrs before Liverpool play Burnley, so we could be 9 clear before they go into that game. If all of that happens then I'll start to believe. I am trying to be more realistic with myself but it is hard not to dream!
Far too soon for talk of a race, pretty much 7 teams in the "running", just gonna sit back and enjoy it.
It was a similarly patchy start last year for us too with our defence, but we eventually got it under control and I think a similar thing is happening this time round. We also have to remember 6 of those goals were from that Spurs game which was very much the exception rather than the rule.
I personally don't think we have it within us to win the title or perhaps even challenge for it, but if we make full use of this momentum up until February to ensure that we have just enough of a gap between ourselves and Leicester, Everton, Spurs, Villa, and Chelsea, then I'll be happy. Top 4 is an absolute must for us if we want to finally finish off the rebuild in the next 2-3 transfer windows and really kick on as a team.
Technically, yes, but in this discussion it is not that relevant. Some people love to imagine that odds often favour City because, apparently, there are scores of gullible punters who for some reason regularly bet on them. In reality, these type of odds (league winner) are not significantly swayed by placed bets, and even if such thing took place, it would be in favour of other, more popular teams.
I don't think we've struggled in the big games this time round per se, it's more that we've settled for draws when the opportunity had arisen, which considering how the team was performing back then (up and down, with the downs being considerably more pronounced than the ups) I can understand the rationale. e.g. Chelsea was after the PSG match, while City was after we got dumped out of the CL. Our confidence as a team was obviously fragile, and rather than opening up and risking a hammering, we took the point that was on offer. Even so, I would say for the Chelsea game, that if one team was going to win it and deserve to win it, it would have been us. While I'd say City just about shaded the Derby.
Of course, there's been some aberrations like Arsenal, as well as the huge outlier of the Spurs match, but I'd wager that now that we have seemingly settled into a good rhythm, we'd be much more proactive against such opposition.
I don't think that home or away is a big thing this year. There is no supporters in stadiums after all. What can make the difference is the pitch players are used to play on and the trip as it is more cosy to stay at home, but on the other way to have a trip means you stays longer with the team so that could be a good thing.
The only team for who it seems to make a big difference is Liverpool as they are winning at home and are abysimal away from home. But that could be psychological and a defeat on there pitch can change everything, even more so since they are not allowed to have supports since lockdown.
I assure you, they do not adjust. If there is significant risk on one outcome, bookies will hedge their position on an exchange or with another bookmaker. There is also bet insurance. But bet amounts and volumes do not change the odds. Odds setting is fundamental to the business model. If they are not offering the most correct odds, they are putting their whole model in danger. Sometimes bookies will provide better odds for promotional reasons (like boosted odds, special prices, etc.) but the margin difference is taken from marketing budgets.
I think "likes" are only given by staff.Thank you, @Rozay! But could you “like” it to make your praise count?
If it’s any consolation I did the same to TAA and Salah recently and they’ve gone to shitYeah, I realized that.
Agree.
I remember that I read somewhere long long time ago that even for home games the team will stay together in a hotel on the eve of a match day. So, it convince me even more the difference between home and away games is not a big deal this season.
Today shows why we won't be anywhere near the title standings come May. We shit the bed whenever we play a big team. It's City's to win who have found their rhythm.
City and Pool were always the biggest contenders. We have an outsider chance.
Kneejerk begins
We had an outsiders chance if Liverpool and/or City's level didn't improve to what they're capable of. If tonight is any indicator, that no longer seems to be the case. They looked a level or two above us.
Not a kneejerk as it’s something that I was saying during the midweek build up for this match tonight. We’ve lose our last three (now four) semi finals - there’s a question whether we have the bottle.
I said I’d swap tonight to beat Liverpool later this month. Let’s hope it’s a bargain that the devil listened to.
I said I’d swap tonight to beat Liverpool later this month. Let’s hope it’s a bargain that the devil listened to.
Today was a league cup game, relax. Had you scored first, you wouldn't have had to come out and you'd have won on the counter. Luke Shaw switching off was the difference today. You're still a good side and no pushovers. Well in contention.
This.
United haven’t been able to do anything against the big six for quite a while now, which is a concern. I can’t see United contending for that reason, as I think we will get no more than five points from our two games against Liverpool, as well as trips to Chelsea, Spurs, City and Arsenal. We’re way too dependent on teams gifting us penalties.
We were far from favourites at the start of this season, and we were far from favourites before tonight. Losing against a better team in the League Cup hasn’t changed anything.
Am i stupid or is there no possible way to get 5 pts from 2 games?
Complete BS. We generally perform very well against other top teams
But hey, why let facts get in the way of a good knee jerk.
Disappointed with the League Cup elimination, but at this point, it's not a big deal. PL is really the real meat of our season. We need to throw everything at it now we have chance to go top. League is not always decided by few big games. We can manage it. We have shown we can go on a decent run, which in this climate may allow us to continue to challenge.