Season tally so far
Units Wagered = 428.00 units
Units Won = 450.52 units
Profit/Loss = +22.52 units (5.3% profit)
See the bottom of the article for a more detailed analysis of betting results.
Thanks to everybody who has read this column during the year. I hope you enjoy the big game this Saturday.
Saturday 27 September
Sydney (1st) v Hawthorn (2nd)
2:30 PM AEST, MCG, Melbourne
View a detailed form guide for Sydney v Hawthorn
Background: We have been spoiled with good Grand Finals during the past decade and one of the best was the 2012 decider played between these teams. Sydney pipped Hawthorn by 10 points in a see-sawing classic that day, with both teams producing some goosebumps moments through goals of the highest quality. The highlights clip below attests to the standard of play.
Hawthorn overcame the disappointment of losing the final match of the 2012 season by returning to claim the 2013 Premiership, which means this is their third consecutive appearance in the season decider. The Hawks secured a routine 36 point victory over Geelong in the first week of the finals before falling over the line by 3 points against a fast-finishing Port Adelaide in last Saturday’s Preliminary Final.
Sydney’s off-season recruit of former Hawthorn spearhead Lance Franklin has helped the Swans improve on a 4th placed finish last season to become the top ranked team this campaign. Sydney defeated Fremantle by 24 points in their Qualifying Final and then demolished North Melbourne by 71 points in last Friday night’s Preliminary Final to gain favouritism for this week.
These sides met twice during the regular season and both games were tight contests decided by less than 20 points, with the clubs sharing a victory each. Under normal circumstances I would use those previous meetings as a guide, but given the personnel for both teams was quite different for those matches I am not going to read too much into them.
Team news: The main team news is at Hawthorn where gun midfielder Jordan Lewis has been passed fit after being subbed out with a knee injury last week, while ruckman Ben McEvoy has been promoted at the expense of Jonathon Ceglar, and flashy forward flanker Cyril Rioli has been deemed fit enough to play his first senior game since severely injuring his hamstring three months ago. Jonathan Simpkin is the unlucky player to lose his place to Rioli. Sydney has named an unchanged side and will field the same 22 players that did the business during the Swans first two finals.
Who will win and why: Sydney was the best team of the regular season and now they have been the best team of the finals, so the Swans are deserved favourites for this Saturday’s match. In my opinion the Swans still represent good value at around the $1.60 mark.
History shows that the form team of the finals wins the Premiership. That seems so obvious when you read it, which is why I think backing the Swans this Saturday is the way to go. The last nine Grand Finals have been won by the team entering the decider with best points differential during the rest of the finals series and Sydney have won their two finals by a combined 97 points compared to Hawthorn’s aggregated tally of 39 points.
Sydney’s dangerous tall forwards, led by ex-Hawk Lance Fraklin have been particularly potent during the second half of the season as opposition defences have not been able to cover the quartet of Franklin, Kurt Tippett, Adam Goodes and Sam Reid. To put things in perspective, Reid would be the number one or two forward at most other clubs, but at the Swans he is fourth in the pecking order!
In the home and away meetings between these sides, Franklin was the main player Hawthorn’s backline struggled to find a suitable match-up for. During those two matches against the Hawks, Franklin won a huge amount of ball across the forward line and only innacurate kicking prevented him from tearing those games apart, with the glamour forward spraying 12 of his 17 scoring shots wide of the target. The Hawks will be in huge trouble if Franklin finds his range this time around.
Both teams have plenty of hard-nuts around the middle, with Josh Kennedy, Dan Hannebery, Kieran Jack, Luke Parker and Jarrad McVeigh all proficient in that part of the ground for the Swans, while the Hawks will look to Sam Mitchell, Jordan Lewis and Luke Hodge to give the outside runners plenty of ball supply.
Speaking of Hawthorn’s outside runners, perhaps their most valuable player of this finals series has been Brad Hill. The fleet-footed wingman destroyed Geelong’s Mark Blicavs in a best-on-ground display during the Hawks Qualifying Final win, before backing that up with another top performance against Port Adelaide last weekend. Sydney’s Harry Cunningham tagged North Melbourne match-winner Brent Harvey out of the game during the Swans victory last Friday night and I expect Cunningham will be tasked with a similar job on Hill this weekend.
Hawthorn’s forward line has been the brown and golds best performed part of the field this season, comfortably ranking as the most prolific point-scoring team in the competition. However, the likes of Jarryd Roughead, Jack Gunston abd Luke Breust will have to work hard to create opportunities against a stingy Sydney defence that has conceded fewer points per game than any other team this season – even frugal Fremantle!
Hopefully this season decider is as exciting as the original 2012 classic between these clubs, but I am tipping Sydney to have the fresher legs and give their potent forward line enough opportunities to build a winning lead when the game opens up in the second half.
Exotic bets: I have gone for a ‘cheeky’ multi on Sportsbet’s AFL Player Exotics goals market. I expect Cunningham to play a defensive role on Hill and that will make it unlikely the young Swan gets an opportunity to impact the scoreboard. The other two players involve a bit more guesswork, but I think odds of $2.50 for Lewis Jetta not to score a goal are generous considering he has been kept goalless in six of his last 10 games, while Sam Reid has only kicked more than one goal in 4 of his 19 games so far this season and odds of $1.75 for that trend to continue are fantastic.
As I alluded to previously in this article, Lance Franklin has kicked 5 goals and 12 behinds against Hawthorn this year, so I am going to place a small wager on him to kick more goals than behinds for a third successive time at juicy odds of $2.90.
My Norm Smith Medal fancy is Dan Hannebery of Sydney. Hannebery played a terrific 2012 Grand Final and finished in the top 3 of the medal voting that day. I was going to take Hannebery outright for the medal at odds of $11 until I realised Sportsbet have a market for the top 3 and the Swans number four was paying $6 for a place. Considering Hawthorn’s Sam Mitchell was also $11 to win the medal but was reduced to $3.50 for a place, I think Hannebery’s top 3 price is excellent.
My final exotic bet is for Hawthorn’s silky midfielder Shaun Burgoyne to score the most AFL Fantasy Dream Team points in his group. Considering Burgoyne plays more midfield minutes than anybody else in his group, I think odds of $5 are rather generous for him to top this group.
Andy’s Bet: 1.5 units on Sydney to win @ 1.60 (Multiple Sites)
Andy’s Bet: 1 unit on Dan Hannebery to finish in the top 3 of the Norm Smith Medal voting @ 6.00 (Sportsbet)
Andy’s Bet: 0.5 units on Shaun Burgoyne most AFL Fantasy Dream Team points in his group @ 5.00 (Sportsbet)
Andy’s Bet: 1.5 units on Sam Reid to kick less than 2 goals @ 1.75 (Sportsbet)
Andy’s Bet: 0.5 units on Lance Franklin more behinds than goals @ 2.90 (Sportsbet)
Andy’s Cheeky Grand Final Multi: 1 unit on Sam Reid to kick less than 2 goals and Lewis Jetta and Harry Cunningham to kick no goals @ 7.43 (Sportsbet)
Season Betting Summary
Round by Round Summary
|
Round |
Units Wagered |
Net Round Result (Units) |
% Profit |
|
1 |
18.5 |
+13.24 |
71.6% |
|
2 |
16.5 |
+1.17 |
7.1% |
|
3 |
15.75 |
-4.63 |
-29.4% |
|
4 |
19 |
+4.26 |
22.4% |
|
5 |
17.5 |
-6.30 |
-36.0% |
|
6 |
18.5 |
-3.63 |
-19.6% |
|
7 |
20.75 |
-0.59 |
-2.9% |
|
8 |
14.75 |
+7.17 |
48.6% |
|
9 |
14 |
-3.84 |
-27.4% |
|
10 |
12.5 |
-2.38 |
-19.1% |
|
11 |
16 |
-4.67 |
-29.2% |
|
12 |
15.5 |
-4.53 |
-29.2% |
|
13 |
15 |
+8.93 |
59.5% |
|
14 |
14.5 |
+1.22 |
8.4% |
|
15 |
14.25 |
-3.87 |
-27.2% |
|
16 |
16 |
-4.14 |
-25.9% |
|
17 |
18 |
-0.52 |
-2.9% |
|
18 |
22.25 |
+3.79 |
17.0% |
|
19 |
17.5 |
-3.65 |
-20.9% |
|
20 |
18.75 |
+2.72 |
14.5% |
|
21 |
24.5 |
+6.23 |
25.4% |
|
22 |
23.5 |
-6.57 |
-28.0% |
|
23 |
20.5 |
+10.38 |
50.6% |
|
Finals Week 1 |
10.75 |
+0.71 |
6.6% |
|
Finals Week 2 |
6 |
+1.50 |
25.0% |
|
Finals Week 3 |
7.25 |
+10.52 |
145.1% |
Bet Type Summary
|
Bet Type |
Bets |
Net Result |
% Profit |
|
2-leg Multi |
17 |
+12.51 |
73.6% |
|
Goals Pick Your Own Line |
16 |
+6.44 |
59.9% |
|
H2H |
38 |
+5.99 |
11.5% |
|
AFL Fantasy Dream Team Group |
20 |
+5.75 |
51.1% |
|
Win by 39 points or less |
53 |
+4.94 |
9.9% |
|
Team Goals (line) |
1 |
+2.55 |
85.0% |
|
Either team by 15 points or less |
3 |
+2.55 |
170.0% |
|
AFL Fantasy Dream Team H2H |
14 |
+2.14 |
11.1% |
|
Supercoach player H2H |
3 |
+1.95 |
27.9% |
|
Disposals Pick Your Own Line |
1 |
+1.90 |
190.0% |
|
Win by 70-79 points |
1 |
+1.50 |
600.0% |
|
3-leg multi |
11 |
+1.40 |
12.7% |
|
Team Score (Line) |
7 |
+0.92 |
10.8% |
|
Wire to Wire (any other result) |
3 |
+0.83 |
30.0% |
|
Total Match Score (line) |
16 |
+0.74 |
3.8% |
|
Supercoach group |
3 |
+0.50 |
20.0% |
|
First Half line |
1 |
+0.48 |
95.0% |
|
Win by 24 points or less |
3 |
+0.19 |
8.3% |
|
Win by 40 points or more |
10 |
+0.16 |
1.3% |
|
Win by 60 points or more |
2 |
+0.10 |
5.0% |
|
Win by 25 points or more |
10 |
+0.04 |
0.3% |
|
Supercoach Individual Line |
3 |
-0.18 |
-4.5% |
|
Medal Winner |
1 |
-0.50 |
-100.0% |
|
Time First Goal |
1 |
-0.50 |
-100.0% |
|
Wire to Wire (lead at end of every qtr) |
1 |
-0.50 |
-100.0% |
|
Half Time/Full Time |
2 |
-1.00 |
-100.0% |
|
Win by 19 points or less |
1 |
-1.00 |
-100.0% |
|
Win by 20-39 points |
2 |
-1.00 |
-100.0% |
|
Win by 40-59 points |
2 |
-1.00 |
-100.0% |
|
Either team by 24 points or less |
5 |
-1.03 |
-29.4% |
|
AFL Fantasy Dream Team Individual Line |
8 |
-1.22 |
-10.6% |
|
Most Disposals in Group B |
27 |
-1.25 |
-7.8% |
|
Second Half Line |
7 |
-1.53 |
-15.3% |
|
Anytime goalscorer |
2 |
-1.75 |
-100.0% |
|
Win by 16 points or more |
7 |
-2.59 |
-23.5% |
|
Most Disposals in Group A |
17 |
-2.70 |
-23.5% |
|
Most Goals |
30 |
-2.75 |
-12.6% |
|
Individual Player Disposals (Line) |
21 |
-2.90 |
-11.0% |
|
Win Q4 |
2 |
-3.50 |
-100.0% |
|
Line |
44 |
-4.16 |
-7.3% |