Championship Day Arrives
February 18th, 2009 by Kevin EganWe’ve all been there before. The trainer who all year long has been quietly preaching the virtues of personal discipline, mental agility, tactical awareness and all those other buzzwords, walks into a dressing room on the day of the championship and turns into a raving lunatic. The wisdom of overlapping wing backs and diagonal ball into the corner forwards morphs into “GEDOUTTHEREANDBATETHESCHITEOUTTATHEMTOWNIEBASHTURDS” (Sic).
Consider this my day to do just that. So far in this column we have preached about the battle between compiler and punter, applying logical thinking and mathematical reasoning to our bets. Well today championship has arrived – a bet of considerable opportunity has presented itself and it is time to throw off the shackles and wade in as if you were marking that fecker from the neighbouring club who had the cheek to cop off with your sister some Saturday night four years ago.
Two weeks ago the Sigerson treated this column well, when GMIT overcame UCC. Last week we came a cropper after UL’s no show in the first half left them eight points in arrears and they fell one agonising point short in the end, drawing the match at full time. Today this column retakes the lead.
The logic for betting on GMIT against Cork was that UCC were very poor and that GMIT were overpriced. Yours truly was in attendance at that game and it pretty much panned out as expected – a mediocre game of football where the home side scraped home after being marginally the better team. In effect, nothing happened to change the view that GMIT were a competitive but limited team. Today they play DIT, a much stronger outfit and a world away from UCC. DIT are missing Mark Vaughan and his absence will hurt the visitors certainly, but their overall strength in depth is still considerably in excess of what GMIT have to offer. Both sides have weaknesses, but DIT’s defensive record all year long has been very impressive and it is highly likely that they will keep GMIT’s physically small forwards (Donie Shine excepted) to eight scores or less.
At the other end one would expect GMIT to compete well, but there are simply too many DIT weapons to keep under control. Travelling to Galway will set DIT back a little bit, but even allowing for home advantage, the price of 6/4 about an away win is simply massive – 1/2 would be closer to the mark. Get your good betting shovel and dig in. This is simply a wrong price and it’s highly possible that this will be the best value GAA bet to be seen all year. Or as that once-calm trainer might have said to you: “GEDOUTTHEREANDBATETHESCHITEOUTTATHEMBOOKIEBASHTURDS”. Maximum bet.
There is some value to be had in today’s other games as well, though not nearly to the same extent. DCU at 8/13 to come away from Cork IT with a win in the bag is probably a little generous, however the home side are very much an unknown quantity, not having played so far in this competition. DCU should oblige, but this column stops short of recommending a bet.
In the other two games, a little nibble on the outsiders looks to be the way to go. NUIG have been quietly impressive in all competitions so far this year and while Jordanstown are undoubtedly worthy favourites, it’s always difficult to win a competition that mentally you’ve already won. Beating Queens in the last round will have meant the world to UUJ and while they won’t lie down today, any team is vulnerable after they’ve just knocked out the perceived favourites. If UCD or GMIT were in opposition here then UUJ would scrape home and then get back on track for finals weekend, but this is exactly the kind of dangerous opponent that they didn’t need right now. At the 11/4 on offer, NUIG are worth a shout.
Finally we come to the Guards against UCD and once again this writer has to own up to complete shock at how strongly Garda College appear to be rated. Unlike the other colleges, the turnaround of players at Templemore is very high since the training time is short. They do have several of last year’s team but this is undoubtedly a weaker line up all the same and with 5/2 available about UCD, there is only one betting prospect here. UCD remain a poor side in this writer’s humble opinion, however their double extra time win over UL will bring them on a ton and they don’t look to have a lot to find here to match up with the Gardaí. Garda College are obviously the most likely winners, but they are a 4/7 shot rather than a 4/11 team. Again, a small bet on the visitors is the way forward.
Now GEDOUTTHEREANDBATETHESCHITEOUTTATHEMBOOKIEBASHTURDS.
Tags: Championship, DIT, Sigerson
Categories: Gaelic Football
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Comments (7)
Kevin,
I don’t know how your perception of UCD has changed to the point where you make them 7/4 shots to go down to Templemore and beat the Gardai,considering you would have made them odds against at home to beat UL?It’s madness.UCD are actually a nice little team and i don’t know are you judging them on their O’Byrne cup performances or what because they never had a full line up together in that competition.Anyway they have very nice footballers but to go down to Templemore and beat a physically stronger garda team without their strongest midfielder John O’Loughlin would be highly impressive.
On to the GMIT game,I presume you aren’t aware of the fact that DIT are without their two starting midfielders,they also have a full back playing with a broken hand.Still i can see your reasoning in fancying DIT,i’m on the other side though
Very hard to get this bet on with so little notice!
I’m aware of that, but unfortunately there’s little I can do when the bookies price these games up so late. I checked late last night and there was nothing, so I got to writing as soon as I saw the prices this morning – but it does leave a very narrow window I’ll grant you.
The unfortunate thing about these games is that when it’s all about price, and every bet is about price, you can’t draft them up without knowing what the bookies are offering. Suffice it to say that if it was 4/1 GMIT and 2/9 DIT my recommendation might have been different – though after seeing the game, 2/9 probably would have been the right price. The gulf in class was just as big as I expected.
Fair enough. Good call on DIT and the other recommendations on NUIG and UCD, just a pity I wasn’t on!
It’s a fair point, I do try and give time, however not being the earliest riser in the world at the best of times, I’m not good to get on these things first thing in the morning.
I have heard that the GMIT vs DIT game was actually evens each of two earlier this morning but that money for GMIT moved them in. No idea who would have done that, but if so then so much the better. I would have piled into evens just as heavily as I did at 6/4 and not been a bit the wiser for it.
Good calls there, something of a shark you are. Any advice on the club games this weekend, especially Porumna vs Ballyhale Shamrocks?
Goose, apologies for being so slow but I meant to get back to this. I won’t go into the games that have gone by except to say that this column is all about value. The reason for backing UL against UCD was the price, something that I still think the match itself bore out. I have great time for that UL side and I do believe that they were greatly under-rated. Likewise I thought the guards were over-rated, but if the guards were available at 5/4 I would have recommended them too. However at 4/11 with this column’s sponsors, they were quite simply unbackable and UCD were the only team you could back.
Never forget that price is the key factor in all your bets.
As for the DIT injuries, I knew about Flynn but didn’t know that Coughlan had the rib injury – however to see him fielding balls like a lord out there, all I could think of was how great it would be if he’d forget about the Dubs and come back to the motherland. He is turning into a fantastic player and he’d be a huge addition to Offaly if he had any interest in coming back to his roots.