The Line Fund and the Margin Fund are less active this week, venturing just 3 and 10 wagers respectively, while the Head-to-Head Fund has, for the second week running, made just a single, surgical selection.

I haven't checked, but I'd lay odds that no team in the history of the competition has recorded back-to-back draws, on which basis we'll need precedent to be set if that first SuperMargin wager based on Combo_NN2's opinion is to prove porcine procuring. A Pies v Swans draw would be worth over 6c to Investors.

Actually, you'd be forgiven for thinking that the Margin and Line Funds had conspired this week to suggest wagers the sole purpose of which was to produce complex patterns on the Ready Reckoner.

The Pies v Swans draw represents by far the round's best possible outcome for Investors, though an upset Port Adelaide victory over the Cats would also precipitate a 4.4c gain. A St Kilda win by 40 to 49 points would also be highly acceptable, adding over 2c to the value of the Recommended Portfolio.

Should Port Adelaide lose by 31 points or more, this would be the worst-possible result for Investors, stripping over 2c off the Recommended Portfolio price, though unfavourable results for the Saints or the Dockers would be almost as bad, each result knocking only slightly less than 2c off the price. Perhaps the most agonising result would be a Fremantle win by exactly 60 points, which would see the SuperMargin wager on a victory by 50 to 59 points fail by a point, and the Line wager, in which we're giving 60.5 points start to Melbourne, also fail, this by one-half a point.

TIPSTERS AND PREDICTORS

With five favourites priced at $1.18 or less this week, it's a little surprising to see quite so much disagreement amongst the Head-to-Head Tipsters. The average level of disagreement is 24% though, as usual, a large dollop of this is down to Home Sweet Home's defiantly independent musings.

The best-performed of MAFL's Tipsters however - BKB, ProPred and WinPred - are all firmly behind the respective favourites.

For the most part, the Margin Predictors are too, though there are two dissenters in the Richmond v Essendon game where Bookie_9 and Combo_NN1 have gone with the underdog Tigers who, priced at $2.08, barely earn the underdog tag.

What's a little unusual this week, if not at first readily apparent, is the level of disdain that the H2H-based Predictors have displayed towards the Lions' prospects against the Blues. They have the Lions losing by about 7 goals where the consensus view amongst the other Predictors is for a loss by only 2 or 3 goals.

That disdain is reflected - indeed is caused - by the probability assessment of the Lions by the H2H Fund algorithm. It rates the Lions as only about 5% chances. By way of comparison, the TAB Bookmaker's head-to-head prices suggest that he rates the Lions as about 30% chances.

The Head-to-Head Fund algorithm also diverges from the TAB Bookmaker in its opinions about Port Adelaide, which it rates as 35% chances to the Bookmaker's 15%. It's on the basis of this differential assessment that Investors find themselves with a 2% wager on Port. 

Overall, the H2H-based Probability Predictors have the highest level of disagreement with the all-Predictor averages this week, while the Overround-Equalising variant of the TAB Bookmaker's prices shows the lowest level of disagreement.

The Line Fund algorithm is, once again, forthright in its opinions about a number of line contests, rating 8 teams as better than 60% chances. That will almost surely result in a significantly positive or significantly negative probability score for the Fund algorithm this week.