Aston Villa V The Toon: Tips Round-Up

My Tips For Aston Villa V Newcastle United: 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.

What a difference a couple of weeks can make.  Not long ago confidence levels seemed to be sinking fast with every match, but the flurry of transfer activity (and of course Cabaye's return from injury) means the future is suddenly looking cautiously brighter.

Despite our victory against Villa being our first win since our defeat of QPR back in December, we're actually now only six points off tenth place.  Ladbrokes currently have us at 8/1 to finish in the top half of the table and if we can repeat our first half performance against Villa on a consistent basis then it may be worth a small speculative bet.

Anyway, for the third week running my tips had mixed results as once again my general football tips outperformed my Toon tips...

Match Result:
20 points on Draw at 3.3 - LOSS
Goals from Cisse and Cabaye, and an all round impressive first half performance, helped us to our first away win of the season and ensured I was overly cautious with this bet.

1st Team To Score:
20 points on Newcastle at 2.0 - WIN 40 points
We've now scored first in 5 of our last 7 league games.

Aston Villa V Newcastle United (29/01/13)

My Tips For Aston Villa 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.

The new signings have given cause for fresh optimism for 'Le Toon', but at the same time it can sometimes take a few games for new players to settle in, so I'm going to go moderately cautious with my Toon tips this week...

Match Result:
20 points on Draw at 3.3
It's seven games since Villa last won in the league, with only two points to show from their last six league games, so Tuesday's match provides the perfect opportunity to end our own poor run of results.  Considering that both sides have had trouble winning matches recently however, I'm therefore going to cautiously go for the draw at odds of 3.3.

1st Team To Score:
20 points on Newcastle at 2.0
Despite our poor recent results, we've actually scored first in 4 of our last 6 league games.

The Toon V Reading: Tips Round-Up

My Tips For Newcastle United V Reading: 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.

Once again my general football tips outperformed my Toon tips, so let's hope the new signings can bring a change of fortunes as at the moment you would have to say it's best to avoid betting on the Toon.  Here's how my tips performed...

Match Result:
20 points on Newcastle at 1.73 - LOSS
With twenty minutes to go we were heading for three points and my Toon tips were looking at a clean sweep as all five of my tips were on course to be winning bets.  Unfortunately though, Reading manager Brian McDermott won the battle of the substitutions and two goals from substitute Adam Le Fondre in the last twenty minutes saw us throw away the game.

Team Total Goals:
20 points on Newcastle To Score Exactly 1 Goal at 3.1 - WIN 62 points
We've now scored exactly one goal in 5 of our last 8 league games.

Newcastle United V Reading (19/01/13)

My Tips For The Toon V Reading

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.

On current form you would have to say that's it's probably wise to be cautious when betting on The Toon at the moment, but here are my tips for The Toon V Reading... 

Match Result:
20 points on Newcastle at 1.73
Despite being second bottom Reading have recently turned things around slightly with two victories from their last three league matches.  However, they remain without an away league victory this season and have lost 9 of their 11 away league matches so they obviously don't travel well.  Despite our own poor recent form therefore you have to fancy us for the victory at odds of 1.73.

Winning Margin:
20 points on Newcastle By Exactly 1 Goal at 3.75
Four of our five home league wins have been by a one goal margin, so this seems like a decent bet.

Norwich V The Toon: Tips Round-Up

My Tips For Norwich City V Newcastle United: 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.

It was a mixed week for my tips, with my general football tips making a reasonable profit, while an uneventful nil nil draw at Norwich put paid to most, but not all, of my Toon predictions... 

Match Result:
20 points on Draw at 3.4 - WIN 68 points
This was a performance with very few positives, but luckily Norwich were equally as poor and so thankfully we managed to end our run of away defeats with a point which could prove valuable later in the season.

Time Of 1st Goal:
30 points on Time of First Goal - 0-10 Minutes at 3.75 - LOSS
Chances were few and far between, never mind goals, so this bet proved to be way off the mark.

Norwich City V Newcastle United (12/01/13)

My Tips For Norwich 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.

On current form you would have to say that's it's probably wise to avoid betting on The Toon at the moment, but here are my tips anyway for Norwich V The Toon... 

Match Result:
20 points on Draw at 3.4
If I'm looking for positives then Norwich go into this match having lost their last four league matches.  Admittedly two of those were against Chelsea and Man City but at least you could argue that we're playing them at the right time.  Our own recent form, however, means I'm not getting carried away and I'm therefore going to cautiously go for the draw.

Time Of 1st Goal:
30 points on Time of First Goal - 0-10 Minutes at 3.75
Early goals have been a feature of our recent league matches, and 3 of our last 5 league games have seen the first goal scored during the first ten minutes.

The Myth Behind The African Cup Of Nations (Part Three)

Staging The African Cup Of Nations In July: Everyone’s A Winner

Staging the African Cup Of Nations in July could possibly
unlock the potential for increased overseas TV revenues.

In part one of The Myth Behind The African Cup Of Nations I investigated the argument that ‘the African Cup of Nations can’t be staged in July because it would be too hot’ and discovered that of the previous four African Cup Of Nations, all four of them would have experienced cooler temperatures if they had been staged in July instead of January.

In part two I covered the likely reasons why The African Cup Of Nations is staged in January when for each of the last four tournaments it would have been cooler to stage it in July.

Now finally I’m going to round things off by suggesting a few additional reasons why I think it would be beneficial to stage the tournament in July...

1) Increased revenues from overseas TV rights.

At the moment, during summers when there’s a European Cup or a World Cup, European football fans have something to get us through the summer and give us our fix of football that we need until the new domestic season starts.  But for two seasons out of every four, European football fans basically have to endure a football famine throughout the summer.  From a marketing point of view, there’s a potentially huge untapped TV market going to waste.

The Myth Behind The African Cup Of Nations (Part Two)

A few theories as to why The African Cup Of Nations is actually held in January.

The African Cup Of Nations.  What are
the reasons why it is staged in January?

In part one of The Myth Behind The African Cup Of Nations I investigated the argument that ‘the African Cup of Nations can’t be staged in July because it would be too hot.’  To quickly summarise the conclusion, of the previous four African Cup Of Nations, all four of them would have experienced cooler temperatures if they had been staged in July instead of January.

So to return to my closing question from part one, why are the Confederation Of African Football (CAF) reluctant to stage the African Cup Of Nations in July when the ‘too hot’ argument clearly doesn’t hold water?

Here are a few possible theories…

1) Resistance to change.

The people who run football have repeatedly shown throughout the history of football that they like to drag their heels before changes are eventually made, even when those changes would clearly be for the benefit of football and for the benefit of all parties involved.

In my opinion this is possibly a significant reason why the African Cup Of Nations is held in January.  Historically it’s always been held in January and therefore no-one wants to be the one to make a decision to change it.  Football ruling bodies around the world have repeatedly shown a resistance to change, so maybe CAF are alike in this respect.

The Myth Behind The African Cup Of Nations (Part One)

Would it be 'too hot' to hold the African Cup Of Nations in July?

The African Cup Of Nations.
Held in January for cooler
temperatures ... or is it?

With Cheick Tiote heading off to the African Cup Of Nations for the next few weeks, it reminded me of a moan I had a few years ago about the African Cup Of Nations being held in January.  In reply my mate argued that it has to be held in January because it would be too hot in Africa to hold it in the summer.

This is an argument I've also seen quoted on other websites, but what people are short-sightedly overlooking is that the rest of the world doesn’t share the same climate as England (lucky for them!).  Just because it’s summer in England doesn’t mean it’s summer everywhere else.

I’m going to point out the obvious here, but the vast majority of Africa is tropical and therefore doesn’t have traditional winter and summer seasons like we do in England.  Instead they have wet and dry seasons (and also monsoon and shoulder seasons in some areas).  And given that Africa is such a huge continent, you can’t really make a generalisation about the climate for the whole continent.  Each country and region has its own distinct climate with varying seasonal temperatures and rainfall fluctuations.

For example, the forthcoming 2013 African Cup Of Nations is being held in South Africa, located in the Southern hemisphere which means therefore that January falls right in the middle of the South African summer.  Straight away therefore the ‘too hot in July’ argument is looking a bit fragile so to investigate things further I decided to look up some figures...

The Toon V Everton: Tips Round-Up

My Tips For Newcastle United V Everton: 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.

Another disappointing result for the Toon resulted in a loss-making week for my Newcastle tips.  This is how things turned out…

Match Result:
20 points on Draw at 3.3 – Draw – LOSS
Despite an encouraging first half performance, this was our 9th league defeat from our last 11 league games, which, together with the reliance of youth on our bench, should surely have underlined to Ashley the need to strengthen our squad during the transfer window.

Both Teams To Score:
20 points on Both Teams To Score - Yes at 1.57 – WIN 31 points
7 of our last 10 league matches have seen both teams score.