Now which is more true in general ?

On the days when a larger percentage than normal of favourites bring home the bacon, the pros and semi-pros are in clover and the mugs are not, or vice versa.
On the basis of the " value " principle, you would perhaps expect the latter, in that finding value means to a large extent swimming againgst the tide. That is, going against the consensus, and it's the consensus that sets the starting favourites at the end of the day.

No idea what you are on about. Are you bored per chance?

Sorry posted that before your first comment, still think you might be a bit bored today though.

Ahead of the wave.  But not too far ahead.

Never bored UA.
Restless perhaps though ?

Going against the tide doesn't mean having a different view of what should be fav.

The favourite in any sporting event is usually non contentious.

OK tober, sounds fair and sensible to me.
Does this mean then that generally the pros stick with betting on favourites  and the mugs don't ?.

The winners would back or oppose the fav depending on wether they thought it was value .

I shouldn't think it matters to them what proportion of favourites win on a given day.

People who disregard value will be drawn to backing favs regardless of price as they believe for some reson they can 'predict the winner' , and the favourite is the most likely winner.

It all boils down to value in the final analysis I would agree with that.
However, I was wondering whether there might be a majority of pros who only look for value primarily in the favourite basket.
For sure value exists widely on non-favourites, but the variances in betting on non- favourites is much higher than on favourites, and so I was wondering if the real pros might tend to stay away from such non- favourite betting, in general only. I am sure there would be exceptions of course.

Pros look for winners surely....there's no point looking for losers...

If you do anything "generally" you tend to lose.

Crunchyfrog over on the cricket forum runs some amazing threads showing how much you'd win by blindly "backing draw" or "backing fav" or "backing 2nd fav" etc for all the tests.

Because of the way it is calculated (and because of commission) it is not unusual to see both "back fav" AND "lay fav" in the red, or similar for other results.

For example right now backdog and laydog (dog being the outsider) are in loss.

laydraw and back2fav are in profit right now, but that could change fairly quickly (at least for back2fav which is only 5 losses away from loss).

Next season I may try running a similar thread for the premiership if I have the stamina.


FAFH: The Pros back AND lay the favourite with an overround. They like to pretend they do a lot of punting but believe me, the real PC payers, those on PC2 and 3 are the ones who are backing and laying and waiting to get matched across the other side.

It is this reduction in risk (indeed done well they are small green in most markets they're involved with) which spurred BF to bring in the original PC. Because they had few downswings if any, their commission was a steady 5% instead of the high effective commission that a punter pays.

Even if you don't get to a green book, you get a better priced and cheaper bet, and can just correct it out.

For instance if I put up £50 to back and lay a team at 1.9 and 1.86 respectively, then even if I only get 10 matched on the lay, and all 50 on the back, then my effective odds are:

Result doesn't happen: I lose the 50 but gain 10, for a net loss of 40
Result comes in: I lose 8.6 but gain 50*9 for a gain of 36.4 (before commission)

So my effective odds are 1.91 (Again before commission, to compare with the market.

So you're "beating the market" by getting an extra tick on a result. That's not enough to produce an edge against a completely fair market, but that's just with getting only one fifth matched one side than the other.

ror
Nobody is disputing that the best way to make money is to make mkts and get on the right side of the spread ( as your example clearly illustrates).
But that's not really my query.
What I'm asking is whether the pros favour identifying " value " bets on favourites over non-favourites in their non-mkt making activities. After all there's not enough room for them all to be mkt. makers and play the spread..

It's sport and punter dependent.

People will quote you favourite-longshot bias (you'll have fun googling that one) in all types of context, but it's only applicable in one type of betting.

*To clarify, that exact researched principle is only applicable in one type of betting, there are many others where either the fave or the longshot can end up being the better blind play of course.

Well let's be specific then.
What is the generally accepted  preference of the pros in football betting ?

I'll pass on that one :)

Not because you don't  know or don't have an opinion I'm sure.
Whatever Lori.

In the case of soccer, I don't know.

If you wanted me to guess, I'd guess that big favourites away from home losing would be good for the pro punters, but I don't know.

On a Saturday, about 5 minutes before kick off, a big4 favourite tends to crash about 5-10 ticks if it is on sky.

It doesn't always, sometimes you get caught out by bad team news. Generally though the late money brings in the favourite.

So earlier backing then reversing at the wrong price is probably "best value" but then you're still opposing the favourite.

But honestly, if the football forum is anything to go by, I'd be wary of anyone claiming to be a football pro. Football markets, match odds especially, are so competitive it is hard to see how you'd identify and extract value.

And I say this despite having my best p&l in football, although my method is more "oppose psychological bias".