Kevin Pullein: free football betting tips & analysis from the Soccer Boffin
Champions Inter have already achieved their aims for the Serie A season
Football tips, stats and philosophy from Kevin Pullein.
Best bet
Sampdoria –0.5 Asian handicap cards
1pt 2.1 bet365
It is possible that bet365 have underestimated the chance of Sampdoria receiving most cards in the Serie A game at Inter.
Back Sampdoria -0.5 Asian handicap cards at decimal odds of 2.1, equivalent to the fractional price of 11-10. Each yellow will count as one card and each red as two. If Sampdoria’s total is higher than Inter’s the bet will win, otherwise it will lose.
Inter have nothing to play for. They have already been crowned champions for the first time since 2009-10.
Teams who have secured a title generally relax and achieve poorer results in their remaining games – not bad, just not as good as before. Because they achieve poorer results they do more defending, and because they do more defending they could make more card-incurring tackles.
On the other hand, Inter have no reason to be concerned about improving the score if it is not in their favour. They are happy. They have already done what they wanted to do.
Sampdoria realistically have nothing to play for either. They are ninth in the table. They cannot be relegated but they are ten points below the last European place with only 12 more available to them.
The result-related markets properly acknowledge lowered motivations. They give Inter a smaller chance of winning than they would have done before – but still quite high. They imply a 66 per cent chance of an Inter win, a 20 per cent chance of a draw and a 14 per cent chance of a Sampdoria win.
In Serie A games with similar result expectations fair decimal odds about the outsider receiving most cards would normally be shorter than 2.1.
On Saturday, with the season winding down there is a higher than usual chance of a low total of cards – and with a low total there would be a smaller chance of Sampdoria receiving more than Inter. Even so, it is still arguable that 2.1 is too big for Sampdoria –0.5 Asian handicap cards.
Thought for the week
Fourteen teams realistically still have something to play for on the last weekend of the EFL season. There are sought-after places still available for promotion from League Two and League One, unwanted places still available for relegation from the Championship.
For teams who do start next season in a different division, what are the likely consequences?
I looked at the records of teams playing in a new EFL division over the past 25 seasons, 1995-96 to 2019-20.
The gap in class between divisions seems to get wider as you move up the EFL. That is to say, the gap in standards appears to be wider between the Championship and League One than between League One and League Two.
Relegated teams did better in League One than in League Two, promoted teams did better in League One than in the Championship.
On average teams promoted from League Two to League One finished 13th while teams promoted from League One to the Championship finished 15th. Teams relegated from the Championship to League One typically finished 11th while teams relegated from League One to League Two typically finished 12th.
Those differences are quite small, however. Most teams who moved to a new division within the EFL finished around mid-table. Newly relegated teams in League One averaged 66 points, newly relegated teams in League Two averaged 63 points. Newly promoted teams in League One averaged 60 points, newly promoted teams in the Championship averaged 59 points.
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