I am sure that most of us who visit this Football section enjoy trying to find some unique "edge" to provide an advantage over the bookies or our counterparts on the exchanges.
However, I wonder how many of us just rely upon stats & data from published online info, available to all, and how many of us build up our own, unique, data bases. It is simple to discover all the basic, general information re. major leagues & teams but, even then, some of the sites can prove to be unreliable & erroneous.
I think that if you select your own small set of criteria in order to choose a specific group of matches and then keep your own database of those results, then that can provide very useful stats which are unique to you.
I believe that the Betfair markets provide the most accurate guides to match outcomes and I respect them greatly, so I would use them to choose my matches.
To give an example based on the foregoing drivel : If you looked at the day's "Match Odds" market and made a list of all games where the favourite was forecast to be 1.80 or above, then you would have a list of matches where both teams had a reasonable chance of winning. If you then took your list to, say, "HT Score" market and checked on which of your matches was forecast at less than 3.0 for "HT 0-0", you would then have a shorter list containing only those matches which the market thought would be fairly tight affairs. This is only an example of one way to choose your niche matches (there are obviously numerous criteria you could use within Betfair).
You could then set up a simple database for your matches with, say, the headings: Date: Match: 1st. Goal Time: HT Score: FT Score: or any other information that you might be interested in.
Over time, you would build-up your database on this niche group of matches, which would remain consistent because the markets are consistent and your matches are chosen by the markets. You can then extrapolate all sorts of stats for this group, such as 1st. Goal Times, Over/Unders, HT Scores etc. etc. and you might stumble upon some invaluable trends.
What I am trying to say, in this long-winded fashion, is that you will be specialising in a small niche sector, whatever criteria you use to choose your matches. If you do specialise and respect the Markets, then I think you have half a chance.
However, I wonder how many of us just rely upon stats & data from published online info, available to all, and how many of us build up our own, unique, data bases. It is simple to discover all the basic, general information re. major leagues & teams but, even then, some of the sites can prove to be unreliable & erroneous.
I think that if you select your own small set of criteria in order to choose a specific group of matches and then keep your own database of those results, then that can provide very useful stats which are unique to you.
I believe that the Betfair markets provide the most accurate guides to match outcomes and I respect them greatly, so I would use them to choose my matches.
To give an example based on the foregoing drivel : If you looked at the day's "Match Odds" market and made a list of all games where the favourite was forecast to be 1.80 or above, then you would have a list of matches where both teams had a reasonable chance of winning. If you then took your list to, say, "HT Score" market and checked on which of your matches was forecast at less than 3.0 for "HT 0-0", you would then have a shorter list containing only those matches which the market thought would be fairly tight affairs. This is only an example of one way to choose your niche matches (there are obviously numerous criteria you could use within Betfair).
You could then set up a simple database for your matches with, say, the headings: Date: Match: 1st. Goal Time: HT Score: FT Score: or any other information that you might be interested in.
Over time, you would build-up your database on this niche group of matches, which would remain consistent because the markets are consistent and your matches are chosen by the markets. You can then extrapolate all sorts of stats for this group, such as 1st. Goal Times, Over/Unders, HT Scores etc. etc. and you might stumble upon some invaluable trends.
What I am trying to say, in this long-winded fashion, is that you will be specialising in a small niche sector, whatever criteria you use to choose your matches. If you do specialise and respect the Markets, then I think you have half a chance.