League Cup Finland 20th Feb 2010 asian hc price limits

EDIT1: FT AC Oulu - Haka 2-0. It is difficult to update the system to really find out how crap Haka is, but fortunately I know it myself and will not be fooled its famous name and history.

Edit3: FT Jaro - KuPS 1-0. One of the three likely outcomes. Nothing would had surprised me there. KuPS lost their best striker Ilja Venäläinen after 26 minutes due injury.


These are more inaccurate estimations than they would be during the season. The home advantage is apparently slightly bigger when played indoors in the winter, but it is very difficult to verify exactly as also the line-ups are far from the norm and there are usually all 5 substitutions made. However, I have achieved good results with this competition because the bookies seem to be suffering even more, and the team news which are already estimated in my odds usually start affecting the odds quite strongly nearing the kick-off time. Despite the price suggested I refuse to take Haka. Not backing them has been a succesful strategy. I took KuPS instead last night at 0,25 @ 1.93

	-0,25	0	0,25	0,5	-0,5	-0,25	0	0,25
Jaro	2,38	2	1,72			2,38	2	1,72	KuPS
Oulu	2,36	1,97	1,7			2,43	2,03	1,73	Haka

Haka are missing or doubtful; "- Toni Kuivaston? peluuttamisesta en vielä ole tehnyt päätöstä. Jarno Mattila ei vielä tähän peliin ehdi mukaan ja Niko Ikävalko on polvivaivaisena, Ristilä kertaa Hakan pelaajatilannetta.

Mattilan ja Ikävalkon ohella Hakalta ovat sivussa pitkäaikaispotilaat Maido Pakk ja Jani Kauppila". There will be two African test players for Haka.

Jaro will be without "Vaikka Jaro saakin muutaman pelaajan takaisin kokoonpanoon, niin sairaslista on silti pitkä. Pois ottelusta ovat varmuudella Heikki Aho, Jani Bäckman, Papa Niang, Petter Meyer ja Björn-Erik Sundqvist. Sen sijaan Janne Vellamo on jälleen pelikunnossa. Jani Sarajärven? pelaaminen on vielä epävarmaa." Jaro are testing a swedish striker Joakim Lengyel.

I am watching no league cup today but concentrating on the preparations of Ykkönen and Kakkonen clubs as they are playing some friendlies today. Klubi 04 - MP being the most interesting of the clashes, where I took Klubi to win @ 2.02 Edit: cancelled Klubi04 bet, MP are actually the better team on the pitch.

Edit2: FT Klubi04 - MP 1-2. Ex professional Eetu Muinonen was doing the playmaker job for MP. A shame really if he can not find a decent club for himself.

Asian handicap price limits for 19th Feb league Cup

EDIT FT results: HJK-MyPa 2-0. Routine win, 1-0 was always the most likely outcome. VPS - TamU 1-0. Odds rose both for HJK and TamU towards the kick-off. TamU had some adjusting problems at Vaasa with the indoor arena, but were the better team on the 2nd half according to the reports and VPS gk Kwon was praised.

Unless something alarming comes up the prices really should be more than the following to be valueable tonight;

HJK - MyPa at 16.00 CET Tali (indoors)

HJK -1      @ 2.09
HJK -0,75 @ 1.86
HJK - 0,5  @ 1.67

MyPa +1    @ 1.91
MyPa 0,75 @ 2,17
MyPa 0,5   @ 2,50


VPS - Tampere United 18.00 CET Botnia-halli (indoors)

VPS  0,25  @ 2.16
VPS  0,50  @ 1.82

TamU -0,25@ 1,86
TamU - 0,5  @ 2,22

Can not see any reason to think that both matches goal expectactions should differ from the norm.

Two matches tomorrow AC Oulu - Haka & Jaro - KuPS, and though my initial estimations show a value team in both matches I think I will skip both of them, these 4 teams tomorrow are pretty much the worst 4 of the League and I do not feel like trusting any of them. If there are big market moves I have to rethink.

League Cup 19th Feb 2010; HJK - MyPa & VPS - TamU

Took one early bet already, TamU - 0,25 @ 2.

Perhaps there will be some previews tomorrow. HJK is hugely overrated at -0,75 @ 1.72, but once more, as a win by one goal margin is very likely I do not feel like taking MyPa + 0,75 despite that it shows a bit of value at 2.21 (limit 2.17). However, it is not enough to cover the analysis risk, there will probably be some team news tomorrow which will change the 1x2 estimate one way or another.

Some team news;

Tamu missing following players , or not. " TamU joutuu otteluun melko kapealla miehistöllä. Pohja ja Jusu Karvonen ovat kuumeisia, Ilari Ruuth menee perjantaina polvitähystykseen ja Jesse-Juho Kuusisto on abiristeilyllä. Lisäksi miehistöstä puuttuvat pitkäaikaisista vammoistaan vielä toipumassa olevat Toni Järvinen ja Aapo Lappalainen."

Pohja (feverish) would be missed.

VPS missing (most likely) " VPS:n kokoonpanoon palaa puolustaja Jussi Äijälä, mutta keskikentältä sivussa on Tony Björk, joka loukkasi nilkkansa lievästi alkuviikon harjoituksissa. KuPSia vastaan pirteästi oikeana laitapakkina pelannut Greg Eckhardt saattaa myös lepuuttaa itseään.

-Gregillä on ollut pientä lihaskireyttä ja hänen tilanne selviää vasta aamuharjoituksissa. Mitään riskiä ei oteta, mutta mistään vakavastakaan ei ole kysymys.

Sivussa ovat myös Tero Koskela, Jan Berg, Sami Salmi, Jyrki Saranpää ja Brian Pope."



And then some moaning and wondering

You may probably have sensed that there is a bit of pressure for me to do something about this blog. Downgrade it or upgrade it, or go commercial. I love getting feedback to puntteri@gmail.com and hearing from you, but there really is no need from you people to hurry me to publish info, picks and limits sooner than I do now. My priority is to get my own and my partners bets in with the best possible odds. As the market movements are quite big in a small market like Finland there is a good chance that the prices rise back to the original level sooner or later. Or even higher than the original and correct price was  like in the case of IFK Mariehamn just a few days ago which was also discussed here.

There have been flattering requests about a possibility to pay me and get a premiur service. It is a proposition I am seriosly considering and not taking lightly by any means, but to be able to do it happily and keep everyone involved satisfied there should be a bit larger customer base  - and it would be the end of the free information as we know it. It would also require a bit of bragging and spamming and that is where I am not going to get involved at all. I must point out though that there will be more than 1000 Finnish football matches on offer in asian betting market also this summer!

Thank you for reading. It makes me happy to know that I do have a wise, loyal and experienced audience and you have come here because of interest, and keep coming back.

League Cup 18th Feb 2010 FC Honka vs FC Lahti

FC Honka -1.25 @ 2.03. 

EDIT: FT 4-1. Felt like taking candy away from kids, Lahti line-up was far from ideal and the numbers could and should had been even bigger. Honka created a goal chance every time they felt like it.

Thank you a lot, but I was actually expecting an even more generous price for that, but I took the 10 % value there was. the early lines usually disappear quite fast after my early bets, but occasionally they rise again nearer the kick-off, can not see it happening with this one though.

FC Lahti today is very shaky in defense, they have two average goalies to choose from, but the actual problem is their defense line. The young defenders from Reipas have very little chances to keep up with the Honka strikers in their own den. Offensively things are not at all that bad, and a Lahti goal would be no surprise at all. Expecting goals tomorrow 14.00 CET at Esport Arena, and majority of them should be scored by the home team Honka. They met in December with an easy 4-0 home win, but that line-up of Lahti was admittedly even worse than the one of tomorrow.

The biggest name in footballing history of Finland - Jari Litmanen - is available and will play at least part of the match, but he is no answer to defensive problems of FC Lahti.

From Veikkausliiga.com, the bold players missing" 

FC Lahden riveistä puuttuvat Loorents Hertsi kouluesteiden takia, nilkkavaivainen Mohamed Fofana, selkävaivainen Drilon Shala, takareisivammasta kärsivä Kalle Eerola sekä pitkäaikaispotilaat Janne Moilanen sekä Heikki Haara. Paluu puolella on Jussi Länsitalo, joka palaa lahtelaisten kokoonpanoon."

FC Honka are without Rasmus Schuller. No updates, i am off to the Arena.

******

Finland scouting services

As you probably have noticed I watch a lot of Finnish football,  over 150 matches live yearly. Along with my network of dedicated football people we easily cover hundreds of matches more. League games, lower divisions, youth matches, internationals and friendlies. If you happen to be a scout working outside of Finland but interested in player or two it might be worth a shout contacting me first before rushing in. There are naturally also several FIFA approved agents in this country and I am not competing with them, just giving you and easy option to check things out.

I can do the preparations for you, even write the initial full scouting reports if you so wish and you can save travel time and expenses, though I must admit, Finland is quite nice in the summer!

Do not hesitate to contact me at puntteri@gmail.com regarding any footballing matters in Finland. Asking costs you absolutely nothing!

*****

IFK Mariehamn - TPS Turku league cup 17th Feb 2010

Edit: This is a good example what can happen to the odds in Finnish football. First time I saw the prices IFK was a favourite, now the odds have turned around and TPS + 0,25 @ 2 has transformed into TPS - 0,25.

Edit2: Obviously my pencil strikes were not big enough, IFK 0  was for a minute @ 2.35, which is quite an astonishing price for the team that is supposed to be the favourite in the match! The market moves are crazy, and the campaign has not even started yet! I still keep my fingers out of this, but with early TPS bet there would had been excellent chances for some nice free profit. Two minutes for kick-off and there still are no line-ups available.

FT 1-0. Match report by IFK here.
-------------------

According to my initial numbers IFK is quite a good value at 0 @ 2.05 compared to my estimation of 1.75, but like I said in the first place, I do not like this fixture at all, too many questionmarks to my liking. Interesting to see if the odds drop even further!

This is not one of my favourite fixtures. Mariehamn have big home advantage, but they tend to dismiss this competition and lack a decent striker. TPS have 2 new test players - well Toni Kolehmainen got a contract with them according to the latest Team News and the othere one is an unknown Dane - which will not help them in this match, but personally I see that a in-form striker TPS Babatunde Wusu can decide these kind of matches by himself.

Asian limits with a big pencil.

IFK -0,25

:

TPS 0,25

48.6% - 51.4% (2.06 - 1.94)

IFK 0

:

TPS 0

57.1% - 42.9% (1.75 - 2.33)

(Edit: TPS - 0,25 has dropped to 1.80 now. Some people obviously know a lot more about this than I do!)

There was TPS - 0,25 @ 2.03, at the moment the odds are pretty much correct. The team news are a bit obscure as always when we talk about Finnish Veikkausliiga news feed, but the IFK Mariehamn players bolded are out, and there might be some other players also missing because of flu.
"IFK:n joukkue on kärsinyt viime päivinä vilustumisoireista ja lopullinen pelaaryhmä keskiviikon otteluun lyödään lukkoon vasta ottelupäivänä. Varmuudella sivussa ovat loukkaantuneet Sasha Anttilainen, Wilhelm Ingves ja Simon Enqvist, Turkissa testileirillä oleva Dmytro Pronevych sekä Kosovon maajoukkueen matkassa oleva Arsim Gashi."

However, these 5 players missing mean almost nothing. Anttilainen, Ingves and Gashi played a lot of minutes last season, but failed to make an impact. 

Igor Utkovic who was tested against FC Lahti is unlikely to get a contract, but former KuPS player Echiabhi Okodugha will have his chance to convince IFK coach Pekka Lyyski on Wednesday.

IFK were supposed to meet Brommapojkarna next week, but due to harsh winter conditions and BP:s unwillingness to play indoors at Eckeröhallen the match is cancelled and perhaps TPS game will be taken a bit more seriously.

TPS have resurrected in the late months. The manager left, two of their best players left along with some others and they were also about to get forced out of their stadium, but with the youngsters improving and some interesting signings like NT legend Jonatan Johansson there seems to be a peace and understanding again in the TPS camp and they can look confidently into the season starting in April. Johansson is not in the squad for some time though as he prefers to tune himself into match fitness on his own back home in Scotland.

All Veikkausliiga transfers so far here!  

***

Finland League Cup 17th - 20th Feb 2010

I will publish asian handicap limits closer to the kick-offs. No proper previews to be expected.

There are 6 matches this week and it is starting to look like a competition slowly. This weekend Finnish top teams also met Allsvenskan AIK and Örebro with following quite staggering results;  

TamU - Örebro 0-6, HJK - AIK 2-1. AIK won Örebro 2-1, but according to the reports it was a bit undeserved.

 The fixtures here, time is local + 2 GMT.

17.2.2010	IFK Mariehamn	- TPS	17:00	Jomala kg
18.2.2010	FC Honka	- FC Lahti	15:00	Esport Arena
19.2.2010	HJK	- MYPA	17:00	Tali
	VPS	- TamU	19:00	Botniahalli
20.2.2010	AC Oulu	- Haka	14:15	Arina Areena
	FF Jaro	- KuPS	16:30	Tellushalli