How to Determine the Strength of Teams for Bets on Football?

The beginning of any analysis of the match begins with an assessment of the motivation of the teams. Focus on results is an important factor that goes inextricably with power. Imagine a situation when one team is stronger than the other, conditionally, much, “by the head,” as observers say.

But the motivation of the rivals is different. A weaker team has an acute motivation to win, or at least not lose in the reporting duel. A stronger team has no such motivation. This can often lead to a nominal sensation when desire hits the class and defeats the nominal underdog.

There are other patterns in which the correlation of motivation and strength interferes. One of the rivals may be already “a couple of goals” higher in class. And even the outrageous motivation of an outsider does not help. Favorite still beats them with minimal effort. The first situation is more typical of domestic championship games, when the underdog cannot be weaker “by two heads”, since this is a league and teams are selected by gradual screening.

Roughly speaking, in the top division of some European TOP-5 championship, there will be no completely weak teams. The second situation more often develops in matches of the Europa League or the Champions League, where a large club met with a representative of some weak league. For example, in the last rounds of the group stage of such Euro cup, the TOP team can already solve all the issues and not have obvious tournament motivation for the match.

A weak team needs a result. If it defeats the grand, it will even go somewhere further. And everything seems to be good for an outsider, the coach of a large team releases a third composition to give a rest basis. However, this does not help the underdog, since the class of even the deepest reservists of the opponent exceeds their own, and they concede.

In this description of real situations from the football world, we have indicated how different motivation and strength of teams can be. The task of the better is to look for the difference in these aspects. For example, if the motivations are the same (score maximum points), then look at the balance of power. If the forces are equal, perhaps an advantage should be sought in the ratio of motivation (one of the opponents may be more needed here and now).

When evaluating the strength of football teams, professional analysts usually divide this concept into several components. They, as layers, follow from the global state of affairs, over several years, seasons, to a short-term state before a particular game. These are factors such as:

• class;
• form;
• composition;
• fatigue.

After going through these points and make an idea of ​​how to evaluate and compare the strength of teams before the match.

Football team class

It is important to understand that a football club is not only 11 people in a uniform who came out to kick the ball against the same blockheads from another organization. Any team has a story that includes some old or more recent achievements. At the same time, there is a leadership team that has ambitions; there is an idea of ​​the status that the club should receive in the process of its development. There is a larger or smaller fan environment, which also has an opinion about where the club was yesterday, where now, and where it should rush tomorrow. It would seem that these are all thoughts in people’s heads, stereotypes. However, everything is not all so simple.

Imagine that two different football teams in the middle of the season take places at the bottom of the league table and run the risk of relegating to the lower league at the end of the season. The first team dangled the entire history in the lower leagues, and the very entrance to the elite is the maximum achievement. The second club is the country’s repeated champion in the past, a well-known brand whose main team is in crisis for one reason or another. For example, a change of generations of players, a change of coach, a conflict in a team, an epidemic of injuries, financial problems, just some kind of game recession and bad luck.

We think that it is not necessary to explain that there are two completely different teams. Fans and leadership of the first are in the seventh heaven with happiness that lit up in the elite division. For many players, this is a unique experience and even the opportunity to show themselves, change the club, get a more expensive contract. The entire environment and within the team itself has a positive template gap between what the team used to be and what it has become now.

In the second team, on the contrary, there is a negatively directed gap of this template itself. Instead of the usual place in, or near a group of leaders, the club fell to the bottom. At the same time, the leadership’s ambitions are at the same level, financial opportunities are higher than any average team, and the players are not bad in kind and by name.

Recall that these two so different clubs occupy a close position at the bottom of the championship, but such different emotions accompany their games. Now the question is which of them is stronger? If you evaluate this very first layer, the class — then the second team, of course. It has much greater potential for growth. The first team is likely to fly out and will take it for granted. The second — if it flies out, it will be a disaster. But most likely, according to the long distance of the season, it will correct the situation and go up.

Here we come across several important intermediate conclusions. Firstly, it is impossible to put the class anywhere and cross out at the same time. Financial opportunities, the ambitions of the leadership, the claims of the fans, the internal discomfort of the players themselves from a low place in the championship — all this creates a tension that cannot pass without leaving a trace. Players either show progress or correct the situation, or scandals, dismissals, rotations on the coaching bridge occur.

Secondly, you can never judge the strength of the team, just looking at the current place in the standings. This is a gross but extremely common mistake among betting beginners. People do not understand at all, or are only superficially familiar with the sport, with the championship. They open the table, see that some team goes lower in the table and instantly concludes that the one above is stronger, and vice versa.

How many times have we seen great or simply strong clubs below the equator of a championship? Chelsea, Manchester United, Everton, Monaco, Lille, Valencia and many other teams, only in the very recent past had such recessions. In many matches, to make a direct conclusion about their strength, based on the occupied line of the championship, was fundamentally wrong and led to losing bets. Here the whole point is that this is the most internal tension, the discrepancy between the class and the place occupied, will certainly come into balance. It is reasonable to wait for things to go uphill with the team and earn bets on its return to the status quo.

Competent practice will be to divide for yourself each championship on such groups:

• giants, contenders for the championship;
• strong teams, candidates for European competitions;
• average teams;
• outsiders.

It is clear that all these categories are very arbitrary. Some teams may surprise us, not just rising or falling, but even jumping through groups. However, single anomalies do not break the picture as a whole. Now we will move on to a more local factor determining the strength, to the current form. This will give us an explanation of why there can be an imbalance between the team’s class and its results, both positively and negatively.

But such a gradation of clubs in each league in the class needs to be done. Of course, this will not be difficult for a betting player and a fan who has been following football for decades. But beginners, or simply young betters, will have to turn to historical information about each of the teams in order to adequately evaluate this very class. The benefit is Google and Wikipedia are coming to the rescue.

We can speak about the class of a team as an integral part in determining its strength in the context of the longest time. This may be a characteristic for its entire history, or at least for 5-10 seasons, if drastic changes have occurred in the quality and status of the club. This is possible, and we are witnessing similar processes. A lot in modern football, like any other sport, money decides. Generations of football players are changing, even rivals are attached to ingenious coaches in 2-3 seasons.

And to keep the club in high places — this means providing a change of personnel without lowering their quality. As we understand, this is only possible with high budgets. For this reason, some clubs can “shoot” for another season without money. But to stay on top without them is impossible. The arrival of a large sponsor can mean great progress and the establishment of a new grand for many years to come. We see this from the examples of Chelsea, Manchester City, Tottenham, PSG and other newly made “money bags”.

Form in football

So we come to the second aspect, which determines the strength of the team. This is a game form. As we found out, the class is determined by the historical heritage, financial capabilities, ambitions and competence of the club management. Based on these factors, a team is formed. Players know what level club they play for. For some, the overwhelming motivation is money.

For many, it’s not at all an empty phrase, in what colors, for whose name they play. However, we understand that to assemble a team, even a cool one, is half the battle. To achieve the result, you need to go from match to match, win, score points. The quality of the game and the outcome of the games directly depend on the form, the state in which the team is. Usually there are two tiers of form: individual and team.

Individual form

It is clear that the team consists of a goalkeeper and ten field players coming out in the starting lineup. It is also worth considering substitute players of the first reserve, who can replace due to injuries to the players of the base, tactical considerations, just to refresh the game. This is a total of about 15-18 people. Therefore, each of them may have a different state, well-being, physical condition.

It happens that even several football players have problems that do not really affect the team’s game at once. This is if they are easily replaced by position. And if the leaders on whom important functions are built in the club’s game experience difficulties with conditions, this is a problem, which will not slow down their impact on the team’s form as a whole.

We can talk about the injury of the main goalkeeper. The club may not have a second equal goalkeeper, and the understudies will not be so reliable. Seeing in the first games with a substitution at the goal that the keeper is not sure, is mistaken, this is a serious argument to put goals in the goal of such a team in future meetings. This is also an argument for considering total bets more.

Of course, if the club is considered to be defensive, often playing on the “bottom”, the departure of the main goalkeeper is not a reason to immediately “load” on Total Over (2.5). But if the teams are disposed to play the attack, the loss by one of them of a reliable goalkeeper is an argument in favor of such bets.

Also, injury or disqualification may affect the player, cementing the center of defense, managing the creation of artificial off-sides and other important functions. Of course, you need to know the composition of the teams you bet on and respond if the lead defender does not appear in the upcoming game. Defense is very important. The loss of even one artist from a played bunch can seriously affect the team form.

The same goes for the attacking component. If a player who usually starts, accelerates or completes attacks fails, and there is no equivalent replacement, this is a nuisance, and you need to take it into account in the forecast.

Team form

In addition to the influence of specific personalities, which can be changed, it is important to note such a moment as the form of the whole team. In other words, we are talking about teamwork. At the beginning of the season, the club may experience a draw-down in the physical form of the entire clip of football players. In the middle of the season, functional pits happen if the coaches poorly calculated the loads and made the players overwork. Better, which grabs the top, does not follow what is happening with the teams in their circle of interests, and will not understand why they began to lose bets. And the whole problem is often just in bad shape.

Also, difficulties with the form can arise when changing the coach or a serious renewal of the composition. A new specialist can shake the base for a while, trying to understand who is capable of what, in order to choose the best combinations. When a team is in this mode of searching for their game, this is not the best time to bet.

You should wait until a steady trend begins to emerge, it will become clear what the team is playing under a new beginning. Similar difficulties may arise if 3-4 new players come to the club at the same time. If we are talking about important positions, then a couple of replacements are enough for the team to temporarily get an imbalance. It takes time to play again.

As you can see, unlike the class of the team, the game form is a characteristic for shorter time periods. After all, about one full season it is unrealistic to speak with such a formulation, even the best and most stable teams are difficult to pass such a distance absolutely evenly. So some small downturns or peak stretches are inevitable. And other teams are generally “rolling” so that the form is very difficult to determine and predict even for 2-3 games. The last option for the bettor only means that until such a team is stabilized, it is better to delete it from the active list.

Usually the game form is judged by the average segments: a month, 2-3 weeks. If the team is relatively stable, then these can be segments: the beginning of the season, the middle to the winter break, after the winter break, at the finish of the season.

Team Optimality

So, from general strokes, we gradually increase the detail of the consideration of teams. Finally, we approach the factors that determine the strength of football teams before a specific game. For specific clubs, we decided on their class and form for this segment of the season. However, we present two typical situations that may arise before a particular game. In the first case, the team approaches the match in the optimal composition, none of the players is injured, not sick, will not miss the meeting due to disqualification.

In the second case, on the contrary, the composition is not complete. There are already possible options. If the rotation player fell out of the cage, this is not such a big problem. If this is one of the flank players, which is easy to replace — the same thing. But if important players have difficulties, then this will certainly affect the quality of the game and the result.

A good analyst differs from a bad one in precisely the ability to capture these points regarding the composition and correctly interpret them in the forecast. Better should determine the degree of attenuation that the team suffered due to losses, introduce a certain rating scale.

There may also be a correction in the composition of the coach not only because of losses, but purely for reasons of rotation. In the tight schedule of matches, the coach chooses which game can be sacrificed and puts out an experimental team of one doubles, or a mixed version. The richest clubs have two almost equal compositions. But very few teams have such capabilities.

So most often reserve cups, Eurocup games when there is no tournament motivation, or championship matches against obviously weak opponents are left to the reservists. Of course, entering the field of non-basic composition is a serious factor. In fact, a better can bet on a club, keeping in mind the possibilities of the foundation, but in reality they will play a double. Lack of sight of such rotations is a terrible mistake, which is often worth losing bets.

Fatigue

Imagine that a team is superior to its rival in class. At some segment of the season, the team demonstrates excellent shape. The composition is optimal. But a factor such as fatigue can intervene. And it can be caused by a tight schedule, the difference of rivals in freshness. For example, the team in question played an additional match in the domestic or European cup, and the opponent rested at that time, preparing for the reporting game. It often happens that the coach does not want to risk releasing the experimental composition.

And we see that the team is moving badly on the field, does not achieve the result that was required for the bet to enter. So to understand the balance of power of rivals in a particular game, you should keep in mind such a factor as the density of the calendar, the possible fatigue of the players. You need to look at the team’s match schedule, evaluate the changes in the composition. Then you can either adjust the forecast, perhaps choose a safer outcome, or completely abandon the bet on such a dangerous match, at least until live.

Conclusions

Thus, the strength of teams is compared across four “layers”. The most basic is the class of rivals, which, if it changes, this process stretches over the seasons. The next layer is the game form at an average distance of several games, at least. Well, the factors that relate to only one specific game: the optimal composition, and the difference in the fatigue of players.