Matt talks stats / Matthew Walton / 11 August 2008 / Leave a comment " class="free-bet-btn" rel="external" onclick="javascript: pageTracker._trackPageview('/G4/inline-freebet');" target="_blank">Free Bet

"Magical" Matthew Walton crunches the numbers relating to the last few seasons to tell us what we can expect from newly-promoted Stoke, West Brom and Hull City this weekend.

Freshly promoted to the Premier League there must be high hopes at West Brom, Stoke and Hull City for the new campaign. But what is their realistic target? A top half finish, a decent mid-table position or simply ... survival.

Well, whatever it might be, the one thing all three clubs will be anxious to do is get away to a solid start. Get some points on the board early in the season and don't get rooted to the foot of the table. If so, it's going to be a long hard slog back in the top flight - just ask Derby County!

To this end Messrs. Mowbray, Pulis and Brown will see the first match of the season as an ideal opportunity to start as they mean to go on. In other words, get a result.

Hull City entertain big-spending Fulham, Stoke travel North to Bolton and West Brom, drawers of the shortest straw, start off with a testing trip to the Emirates.

How will these sides fare? This is the question we set ourselves the task of finding out. Blowing the dust of our Premier League formbooks as another season gets underway. Trying to find out what we should expect from these three sides this coming weekend.

We've looked back over the last 15 seasons, covering a total of 44 promoted sides from Barnsley to Blackburn, Sunderland to Swindon, Wigan to Watford - all in search of a few vital clues to help us predict the outcome of these opening day matches (and make a few quid in the process!).

The table below illustrates, in simple terms, the success rate - or rather the lack of it - of the 44 promoted teams in their first match of the Premier League season. Their first match back in the big time.

As you'll see, of the 44 sides there were just 10 victories recorded between them (23%) in their first match with 12 draws (27%) and a rather predictable 22 losses (50%).

Of these, the 10 wins were split 50/50 between home matches and away matches as we saw five wins apiece for sides playing on their own ground or travelling elsewhere.

From the 12 draws, there were 7 draws for sides playing at home (58%) and 5 draws recorded by teams on the road (42%).

As for the 22 defeats, 9 sides lost at home (41%) and the remaining 13 lost away (59%).

As you can see, a return to the Premier League is met with a quick reality check - think back to Crystal Palace losing 6-1 at home to Liverpool in 1994, Sunderland going down 4-0 at Chelsea in 1999, Wolves losing 5-1 at Molineux to Blackburn in 2003.

However, by the same token, Sunderland won first up last season (1-0 at home to Spurs), Reading beat Middlesbrough 3-2 to start the 2006/07 season before and West Ham beat Blackburn 3-1 the year before that.

One thing it's also worth noting, whether by accident or design, is that promoted sides tend to get off lightly in terms of opponents in their opening day matches.

From the 44 matches studied we see Manchester United and Liverpool appear as opponents just twice, Chelsea and Arsenal a mere three times each. Most games tend to be against middle to lower ranked opposition suggesting, if anything, that results might even be on the 'better side of good' when all is considered.

Hence, returning back to the opening fixtures for the three sides in question, West Brom have been the most unfortunate in landing a match with Arsenal. Middlesbrough did get a draw there on opening day in 1995 but both Birmingham (2002) and Nottingham Forest (1998) have lost since.
Stoke City are away but might fancy their chances against Bolton. Wanderers haven't faced a newly promoted side in their first match.

As for Hull City their first match is against Fulham. Similarly the London side haven't played a promoted team first up in the last 15 years.

Turning to the prices on Betfair, we find West Brom at a huge [17.5] for the win and [7.2] the draw with the Gunners down at [1.23].

Stoke are [5.1] for the win, the draw is [3.55] and a Bolton win is [1.89].

Finally, we find Hull City [2.74] to beat Fulham, with the Londoners at [2.82] and the stalemate priced up at [3.45].

Given the data available to us, we have 21 sides playing at home in the study group of 44. They produced 5 wins (24%), 7 draws (33%) and 9 defeats (43%). Accordingly, Hull City are plenty short enough for their match with the draw being slightly over-priced. Best bet is actually the Fulham win at [2.82] - they should be nearer [2.32].

The two away sides, Stoke City and West Brom. Here we have 23 away matches for our 44 team study. These returned 5 wins (22%), 5 draws (22%) and 13 losses (56%). This equates to odds of around [4.50] for the win and the draw, nearer [1.78] for the loss.

By this token, the draw is the least attractive option in the Stoke/Bolton match and, surprisingly, the Arsenal win against West Brom - better play would be to lay the Gunners.

So, food for thought on the first day of the season. As ever, we research the statistics and apply them to the Betfair markets in order to highlight clear and self-evident glitches in the prices (and so the value) which is available.

Clear and evident, of course, if you know where to look!

Tags: Hull City football, Premiership betting, Premiership promotion