Adelaide versus Collingwood

AFL Finals Thursday 4 September Adelaide Oval

Adelaide versus Collingwood

Adelaide versus Collingwood we have top placed Adelaide takes on fourth placed Collingwood. This is a double chance Thursday night AFL final from Adelaide Oval. Forget other modern day rivalries, these two ARE the two penultimate modern day rivalry. And throw in the Izak Rankine issue gives this game even more spice. The last 5 games has seen an average margin of 4 points per game in a range of 1 to 10 points. 7 of the last 8 has seen an average margin of 4.5 points per game. So this is the game we all want to see.

Last head to head game

The Crows won the last meeting two weeks ago 59-56 but that was their first win over Collingwood in a prior losing run of 10 games. In this game two weeks ago, Collingwood led the inside 50s 71-37 and on every possible metric Collingwood win this game but they didn’t. The last meeting was at Adelaide Oval and we are here again. Collingwood has won 3 of the last 4 meetings between the two teams. All 4 meetings at Adelaide Oval over recent years have continued the tight result trend. This time average margins is 3.5 points per game. The recent low scoring trend continued last game between the two. The last 5 head to heads we get average 138.4 points per game in a range of 117 to 162 points. This gives us both teams averaging about 70 points per game against each other the last 5 meetings.

Both sides in average form

On our HBM Human Behaviour Model assessing team performance, the trough profiles of both teams (as opposed to peaks) have similarities. However the difference is Adelaide’s trough results has still seen them win. However Collingwood has delivered trough losses in the main, in fact 6 of the last 7 games are troughs and 5 of those are losses. In other words, Collingwood has failed to beat market expectations 6 of the past 7 games. Adelaide has failed the last 4 games (but has won those games).

Recent performances

4 and 5 weeks ago the Crows peaked with a blowout win over Port then a narrow win over Hawthorn in a high scoring affair. Since then it has just beaten cellar dwellers North and West Coast and the Collingwood win. Collingwood has fared little better with recent wins over Melbourne and Richmond but losses to Adelaide, Hawthorn (blowout) and Brisbane.

This is complicated from a betting perspective and we feel there is no clear favourite. The trough losses from both sides is unprecedented and this makes a clear spread or win bet difficult. As a result we take small bets on margin markets and game and team totals.