2012 Round 8 Results : There But Sometimes Only Thereabouts

This week's results added almost 5c to the value of Investor Portfolios, which are now priced at $1.051.

What's most pleasing about this result is that it came on the back of positive returns from two of the Funds and that the third Fund, the Margin Fund, generally landed on the debit side of the luck ledger this week. Sure it was lucky to secure the one SuperMargin wager that it did, the Dons' victory margin of 19 only just squeaking into the required 10-19 point range, but it was also within 2 goals of securing any of four others.

Net, the Margin Fund shed 2.5c on the round leaving it up 10c on the season, while the Head-to-Head Fund gained 3.6c to move to a profit of just over 11c and the Line Fund gained 8.5c to finish at just 0.5c under break even on the season.

If, eight weeks ago, you'd offered me a 5c Overall profit at this point in the season, I'm sure I'd have taken it. If you'd told me that this profit would have been solely attributable to the Head-to-Head and Margin Funds, I doubt I'd have believed you though.

Only two underdogs were victorious this week - the two Adelaides - which made for another week of generally strong head-to-head tipping. The all-Tipster average was 6.6 from 9 with the best performance attributable to Home Sweet Home, which managed 8 from 9 missing only the Crows' upset win over the Blues, and the worst performance down to STM I, which managed only 4 from 9. We remain with 13 Tipsters atop the leaderboard, all on 57 from 72 (79%).

Despite the relatively large victory margins in the round, five of them exceeding 6 goals, margin prediction proved quite accurate this week, since all but one of the larger victories came in games that were expected to produce them.

The all-Predictor average of 27.64 points per game for the round was the 4th lowest average this season. ProPred7 produced the round's best performance of 24.39 points per game, and Bookie9 produced the round's worst performance at 31.12 points per game. Bookie9 nonetheless continues to lead allcomers with a season-long record of just under 27 points per game, still ahead of Combo7 and Bookie3. ComboNN1 climbed a number of places this week into 4th spot after scoring a creditable 25.26 points per game.

For the sixth round in succession, and the seventh round of the season, as a group the Margin Predictors produced line betting predictions that exceeded chance. This week they managed 5.8 from 9, including a 7 from 9 for ComboNN2 which was enough to elevate it to a 50% record for the season, meaning that once again all Margin Predictors have a season-long record that is equal to or better than chance.

Their SuperMargin performance also remains impressive, with eight of the thirteen producing predictions that would have yielded a profit on SuperMargin wagering had they been followed in every game, with ROIs ranging from about 4% to almost 50%.

The same eight Predictors would have also produced profits, of about the same or higher magnitude in terms of ROI, had their predictions been followed only when they predicted a Home team win or draw.

Head-to-Head Probability Scores were also highly positive for another week. Best performed was ProPred though WinPred's results were only slightly inferior and were, in any case, sufficient to elevate it above the TAB Bookmaker, who again finds himself last on our list.

The Line Fund algorithm did not fare as well, turning it its 2nd-worst score of the season. Fortunately for Investors, however, its probability estimates were on the right side of 52.6% for 3 of the 4 Home teams we wound up wagering on.