Tuesday 30 October 2012

Liverpool V Newcastle United (04/11/12)

My Tips For Liverpool V The Toon


Every match I give myself 100 points to place a few hypothetical bets on Newcastle and 100 points to place a few general football bets using the odds available from SkyBet.com.  I then compare how the two sets of bets perform and analyse whether it's better to bet with your heart or your head.

Here are my predictions for the Liverpool match on Sunday...

Full Time Result:
10 points on Draw at 4.0
Despite Liverpool having only two league wins so far this season, SkyBet make them the odds on favourites at 1.57.  That means there's generous odds to be found for the draw and also for us to win.  With three away draws from our four away league games so far this season, the draw looks the safer bet at odds of 4.0.

Double Chance:
20 points on Newcastle or Draw at 2.25
Given that Liverpool have only won one of their five home league games so far this season, odds of 2.25 for us to win or draw seems like a decent bet to me.

Monday 29 October 2012

The Toon V West Brom: Tips Round-Up

My tips for Newcastle United V West Brom: Round-Up


Every match I give myself 100 points to place a few hypothetical bets on Newcastle and 100 points to place a few general football bets using the odds available from SkyBet.com.  I then compare how the two sets of bets perform and analyse whether it's better to bet with your heart or your head.

Both my sets of tips made a profit this weekend, with Demba Ba’s early opener and Cisse’s late winner ensuring that my Newcastle tips were particularly successful.  Six of my seven Newcastle tips this week proved to be winning bets…

Full Time Result:
10 points on Newcastle to win at 2.0 – WIN 20 points
We weren't really at our best against West Brom and things looked to be heading for the draw until Papiss Cisse's brilliant(!) late winner.

First Goalscorer:
20 points on Demba Ba at 5.0 – WIN 100 points
Before yesterday’s game, Demba had scored four goals in his three previous Premier League games against West Brom, and happily he continued that run with the opener in yesterday’s game.

Thursday 25 October 2012

Newcastle United V West Brom (28/10/12)

My Tips For The Toon V West Brom


Every match I give myself 100 points to place a few hypothetical bets on Newcastle and 100 points to place a few general football bets using the odds available from SkyBet.com.  I then compare how the two sets of bets perform and analyse whether it's better to bet with your heart or your head.

European matches are always a bit trickier to predict than the league, so I'm going to skip tonight's match and go straight to my predictions for the weekend...

Full Time Result:
10 points on Newcastle to win at 2.0
SkyBet make us the evens favourite for this match but fifth placed West Brom could prove a tough test so I'm limiting myself to 10 points on us in the 'Full Time Result' market.

First Goalscorer:
20 points on Demba Ba at 5.0
Demba has scored four goals in his three previous Premier League encounters against West Brom, so although he hasn't scored in our last two league games I'm going to go for a small bet on Demba to get the first goal against West Brom.

Tuesday 23 October 2012

Mackems V The Toon: Tips Round-Up

10 Men Were Almost Better than Twelve…


Every week I give myself 100 points to place a few hypothetical bets on Newcastle and then another 100 points to place a few general football bets.

Things looked to be heading for a hard fought victory on Sunday until a fluky late goal for Sunderland denied us the three points.  My Newcastle tips still managed to make a profit, though.  This is how things turned out…

Bets on Newcastle…
Full Time Result:
20 points on Newcastle to win at 3.1 - LOSS
In the early stages of the match we looked by far the better team but unfortunately Tiote’s harsh sending off changed the pattern of the game.  Even with ten men we looked for a long time like we were going to hang on for all three points and it took a fluky late goal for Sunderland to deny us the victory.

Asian Handicap:
15 points on Newcastle +0.25 at 1.77 – WIN/PUSH – 21 points
This bet was on course to return 27 points until Sunderland’s fluky late goal, but still returned 21 points thanks to the bookies poor judgement in giving us a +0.25 headstart in the Asian Handicap market.

Tuesday 16 October 2012

Mackems V The Toon (21/10/12)

My Tips For Sunderland V Newcastle United


Every match I give myself 100 points to place a few hypothetical bets on Newcastle and 100 points to place a few general football bets using the odds available from OLBG.com.  I then compare how the two sets of bets performed and analyse whether it's better to bet with your heart or your head.  These are my predictions for this weekend...

Full Time Result:
20 points on Newcastle to win at 3.1
Sunderland have drawn four of their opening six games so far, whereas we’ve also taken three draws from seven league games, so the neutrals may be tempted once again by the draw.  The whole point of this blog though, is to see whether it’s better to bet with your heart or your head and as there’s no fun in betting on the draw I’m going to go for Newcastle to win at odds of 3.1.

Last Goalscorer:
10 points on Shola Ameobi at 8.0
Usually I would stay away from Shola in the first and last goalscorer markets, but against the mackems that’s obviously a different matter.  You would think Pardew is likely to start with Ba and Cisse, but given his track record Shola has a chance of coming on at some stage, so I’m going to bet with history in mind and go for Shola to continue his impressive goal-scoring record against the mackems with the last goal of the game.

I’m also going to go for a few small bets in several of the other markets available…

Saturday 13 October 2012

Wonga Jokes

Most fans have probably heard all the Wonga jokes a hundred times by now, but as there's no Newcastle match this weekend I thought I would post a collection of some of the Wonga jokes from the last week.

1) In honour of our new sponsors Wonga, a pint at home matches will now cost £2 before kick off, £50 at half-time and £4000 after ninety minutes.

2) Newcastle United are proud to announce that the new Wonga sponsored home shirt is now on sale priced at £39.99 or twelve monthly payments of £179.99.

3) Following the announcement of Wonga as our new sponsors, all NUFC box office purchases will now be subject to a hidden 4063.9% APR surcharge.

4) Alan Pardew has told his players to forget about all the commotion over new sponsors Wonga and go out their on the pitch and give 4,107%.

5) In an uncharacteristic display of openness, Newcastle have revealed that the new Wonga sponsorship deal is worth £6 million a year, although we will have to repay £12 trillion at the end of the contract.

6) Finally, this last one is a fact, not a joke. If you borrowed £100 from Wonga and made no repayments, in less than six years you would owe more than the US national debt (£10 trillion).

Personally, for all the talk about how the Wonga sponsorship deal is bad for the image of football, etc, I think it’s worth pointing put that a week ago very few people would be able to tell you what interest rates Wonga charged. Now though, pretty much everyone knows that Wonga charge over 4,000% APR.

So to summarise, we get a reported £24 million over four years and St James Park restored to its true name (not that it was ever called anything else), and added to this we also have increased public awareness of Wonga’s business practises, thereby allowing borrowers to make a more informed choice as to who they borrow money from in future.

Sounds okay to me.


Footnote: I'll be posting my tips for Sunday's match against the mackems on Thursday.

Tuesday 9 October 2012

The Toon V Man U: Tips Round-Up

My Tips For Newcastle United V Man U: Round-Up


Every match I give myself 100 points to place a few hypothetical bets on Newcastle and 100 points to place a few hypothetical general football bets using the odds available from OLBG.com.  I then compare how the sets of bets performed and analyse whether it's better to bet with your heart or your head. 

Both my sets of tips made a profit this week, but unfortunately not in the way I was hoping.  This is how things turned out… 

Bets on Newcastle... 
Full Time Result: 
30 points on draw at 3.7 – LOSS 
Things got off to a terrible start with two goals conceded in the first fifteen minutes when unfortunately Man U dominated possession.  After that we had a much better spell and the final statistics show that we actually ended the game with more shots and possession than Man U (Shots: Toon 13, Man U 12 - Possession: Toon 53%, Man U 47%).  It's frustrating though, how on several occasions this season it seems as if we have to go behind before we start playing well.  Our cause wasn’t helped when referee Howard Webb failed to spot a blatant first half penalty for some shirt pulling in the box by Patrice Evra, and we also had a ‘goal’ not given in the second half when the ball looked to have crossed the line, so the luck wasn’t with us.  Overall though, we need to start playing well for the full ninety minutes rather than waiting until we go behind before we come alive. 

Half With Most Goals: 
35 points on first half at 3.1 – WIN 109 points
My prediction of an open start to the match came true but unfortunately not in the way I was hoping.

Friday 5 October 2012

Newcastle United V Man U (07/10/12)

My Tips For The Toon V Man U


Every match I give myself 100 points to place a few hypothetical bets on Newcastle and 100 points to place a few general football bets using the odds available from OLBG.com.  I then compare how the two sets of bets performed and analyse whether it's better to bet with your heart or your head.  These are my predictions for this weekend...

Bets on Newcastle...
Full Time Result:
30 points on Draw at 3.7
Howard Webb has been appointed as the ref for Sunday's game so it'll be an even tougher game than usual as we'll be up against twelve men.  However, Webb was the ref in the corresponding fixture last season and although he did deny us a penalty when Ferdinand fouled Ba, we still won 3-0.  Back to this season, our league form so far has seen us play out three draws from six games, so given the opposition I'm therefore going to downgrade my usual optimism and go for another draw on Sunday.

First Goalscorer:
15 points on Demba Ba at 8.0
Demba has been in impressive goal-scoring form so far this season and hopefully this will continue on Sunday.

Tuesday 2 October 2012

Reading V The Toon: Tips Round-Up

My Tips For Reading V Newcastle United: Round-Up


As previously explained every match I give myself 100 points to place a few hypothetical bets on Newcastle and 100 points to place a few hypothetical general football bets using the odds available from OLBG.com.  I then compare how the sets of bets performed and analyse whether it's better to bet with your heart or your head.  This is how my bets performed over the weekend...

Bets on Newcastle...
Full Time Result:
50 points on Newcastle at 2.5 - LOSS
Unfortunately we haven't really recaptured last season's form yet and could only manage a point against Reading.

First Goalscorer:
20 points on Demba Ba at 7.5 - LOSS
Demba kept his excellent goal-scoring start to the season going, but sadly not before Jimmy Kebe had already opened the scoring for Reading.