A Slow Week

International friendlies plus family and work commitments meant that last week was a bit of a holiday and despite the usual over excitement about the Premiership there's not really that much on offer on Saturday.

However, for early(ish) risers the J-League presents an opportunity but due to time constraints I'm just going to show what I'm going to do rather than present the logic behind it. Minimum stakes as usual for illustrative purposes.

Shimizu S-Pulse v Yokohama F-Marinos

Half time dutch on Betfair:  back Shimizu £2.02 @ 2.66, the draw £2.36 @ 2.28 = £1 profit if either Shimizu are winning or there's a draw at half time.
Insurance bet: Draw or Yokohama to cover the Betfair liability of £4.38

Despite going behind to a very early goal, Shimizu equalised with ten minutes left in the first half. £3.18 profit.

Full time: back Shimizu on Betfair £2.00 @ 2.02 = £2.04 if Shimizu win.
Insurance bet: Draw or Yokohama to cover Betfair liability of £2 if Shimizu don't win.

Yokohama went on to win the game with a goal from former Celtic player Shunsuke Nakamura - so no overall gain.

There's a decent prospect in the Russian Premiership later on and I'll update this post when I've done some data mining. 

Right, over to Russia for the game between Zenit St. Petersburg and Dinamo Moscow. Zenit lead the Russian Premier by seven points; Dynamo are in the bottom half of the table but as the dreadful old cliche goes 'are probably too good to go down'. The question is whether Dinamo are good enough to beat Zenit.

The first problem for Dinamo is that Zenit have lost once at home in the last 20 league games and are undefeated at the Petrovsky Stadium this season. Dinamo's away record isn't the worst I've seen recently but they haven't won away for seven games; the recent head to head record between the two in St. Petersburg isn't encouraging for Dinamo either - no wins in the last six. My first thought was to lay Dinamo outright but as the goal expectancy for this game is low and there's a really good chance of a draw at half time, I'm going to go down that route.

Half time dutch (Zenit/draw): 60p if successful, insurance is draw/Dinamo Moscow at bwin.
Full time: Zenit £1.22, insurance is draw/Dinamo Moscow...more later!