Trading Talk - a sports trading preview

2nd January 2009

The turkey sandwiches have nearly all gone, we're all half a stone heavier and there's a week off in the Premiership. It's not all doom and gloom though, as we've got FA Cup weekend to look forward to - always some of the most difficult games for the Sporting Index traders to price up. We'll start with Wigan's trip to White Hart Lane on Friday night and Steve Bruce will be hoping to become the first Latics manager ever to defeat the North London club. Spread bettors will be interested to learn that although Wigan have never beaten Spurs, they have drawn four of the last seven, including a goal-less draw here in September. Harry Redknapp's side are the clear favourites in this game with a supremacy spread of 1.2-1.4, but it may be the total goals market which will get punters interested. The last two games between these sides have only produced two goals, which will please sellers at 2.4 with Sporting Index, but prior to that, the previous five games had averaged 4.2 goals per game.

The big game on Sunday sees Man United travel down to struggling Southampton for a 4pm kick-off. United are understandably the clear favourites at 1.8-2, but sellers of their supremacy on the spreads will take encouragement that the Saints have won two of the last five league encounters between the two clubs on the south coast. They have been struggling in the Championship this season though and have now lost three and drawn three of their last six games. Worryingly for those spread punters who are hoping for an early Saints goal is that they have only managed to score three goals in their past seven games at St Mary's. Buyers of the time of the first Southampton goal will also point to the last time these sides met in the FA Cup here; a 4-0 trashing in 2005, with goals from Keane, Ronaldo and Scholes.

Many spread betting punters will highlight FA Cup games as the perfect contests to get stuck into the bookings markets. Well, if you look at the Saints last two league games, the buyers are likely to start licking their lips, as there have been 60 and 50 points handed out respectively. However, United and Southampton obviously aren't the teams to rile each other, as the average make-up for the last 10 games between the two is just 15. In fact, there haven't been more than three yellow cards dished out in any of the past 14 games between the sides.

The first test between Australia and South Africa was one of those games which typifies the excitement that spread betting can add to test match cricket. The Aussies started off reasonably well, holding a decent 84-run advantage after both teams had batted once. Even after their 319 all out in the second innings, spread bettors the world over would have been hitting the buy button in Australia's win index. South Africa not only hadn't won Down Under since January 1994, but a successful chase of 414 would have been the second greatest chase ever in the history of cricket. It was a similar story at the MCG in Melbourne, as the South African's ended the second day nearly 200 runs down on their hosts. As with India against England though, international cricket sides have the capabilities to register massive chasing scores and the spread betting public are wise to make sure they constantly monitor their in-running positions.

After Melbourne, the sides move onto Sydney and although that was the last place the Springboks won in Australia prior to their amazing test victories last week, it has not been a happy hunting ground since. Buyers of Australia's spread supremacy will be glad to hear that the winning margin in the last three tests has been by 8 wickets, 10 wickets and an innings and 21 runs. Of course, these are two very different sides now, but the home side's record at the 44,000 capacity ground is pretty astonishing - winning 12 of their last 14 tests here and only losing one to England in 2003. It tends to be a high scoring ground and those spread punters looking to buy Aussie innings runs will take heart that they scored 864 runs in both innings in their last test here against India. Those who like cricket spread betting invariably have a punt on batsmen's runs and one player who has done well at this venue recently is Andrew Symonds. His average in his last three innings is a paltry 136!

It's a big weekend for darts as the PDC tournament reaches its climax and the BDO tournament begins. Spread bettors familiar with darts will be well aware of Phil Taylor's dominance in the breakaway PDC division over the past years, but Sporting Index offers a range of alternative markets which may hold more interest to punters for the final stages of the contest. Spread markets are available on the number of 180's to be scored in total over the whole competition and Sporting Index's traders are expecting records to be broken with the market set at 525-531. Sellers of the tournament total will hope that last year's total, and the current record of 503 (over 1298 legs) will not be troubled. The individual record for 180's scored for a single tournament is held by Raymond Van Barneveld, who acheived 51 in 2007. His current price is set between 39-42 - early buyers of this spread will be eagerly watching his progression in the competition and hoping for a repeat of last year. Barney's 180 record beat the previous set by none other than Phil Taylor - interestingly, his 180 prediction is set exactly the same as the Dutchman's.

The BDO competition is yet to get underway but spread punters will have already studied the draw closely and buyers of the big guns' outright index markets will be hoping that at least the first few rounds follow form. Last year's champion Mark Webster's index is set at 21-24 (60pts to tournament winner, 40pts to runner up, 20pts to losing semi-finalist, 10pts to quarter-final losers and 5pts for reaching the last 16) and Simon Whitlock, last years' runner-up can be bought at 18pts. Buyers of both Webster and The Wizard may have noticed the two are in separate halves of the draw - they will no doubt be hoping that last year's final can be repeated.