24 June 2025

72 thoughts on “Finding a System Using the HO/AO Quotient

  1. Dear Soccerwidow,
    since I bought your book and started to study seriously, I meanwhile gathered a lot of data from Oddsportal.com included the odds which are a sort of mean of odds offered from three or four Bookmakers. After finished the book I have been intrigued by your HDAFU system which is a fantastic statistical model, but now I am a bit scared because of the odds I gathered are too close to the KO time, do you have any suggestion on how to use them compared to the current ones? could they lead me to make errors?

    1. Hi Giampietro, odds fluctuate before kick-off but they don’t change hugely. So, it doesn’t really matter when you check the odds. A former favourite doesn’t suddenly become the underdog and vice versa (unless the favourite and underdog prices were close, to begin with).

      I understand that you’ve got the course book so you then know what I mean when I speak of ‘fair odds’ ranges. Please do a little exercise…

      Pick any game, ideally, one with good liquidity. Find the Over/Under odds for that game 48 hours before kick-off (unfortunately, we can only do that exercise with O/U odds as I haven’t published anything yet on how to calculate HDA odds, sorry!). Get them all! O 0.5, O 1.5, O 2.5, and so on

      Calculate the expected ‘Zero’ odds for that match as well as the expected odds range.

      24 Hours later… Get the changed odds… Compare them with your calculations as well as with the odds you gathered the day earlier.

      Now, approximately 3 hours before kick-off, gather the odds every half hour.

      Can you see in which direction they are changing, if at all?

      It is very likely that the odds that already were within the ‘fair odds’ range will remain in that range and that the odds that were outside the ‘fair odds’ range have moved closer to it; often they will end up within the range just before kick-off.

      The market is relatively ‘fair’ as there are thousands of people that carry out calculations like you. If there is any huge discrepancy between the prices (odds) in the market and the probabilities, this is spotted immediately and taken advantage off. The bookmakers are aware of that and try their best not to allow for arbitrage situations.

      This applies to the Over/Under odds and of course, to the HDA odds as well. It’s just that with the HDA odds they may be a little bit distorted just before kick-off when the team news is published.

      For example, a favourite ‘fairly’ priced at say, 1.5. Prior to kick-off, it may suddenly drop to 1.45 or 1.4 purely because of a higher demand by the punters. This happening doesn’t change the probability of that team winning – it’s just a reaction to the higher demand.

      But anyway, there are never any ‘massive’ odds changes and these changes don’t have a massive effect on the HO/AO quotient.

  2. Hello soccerwidow, amazing resources and website, thank you! Question – for quite a few systems that I found (and back tested to 2013..) it looks like the ‘edge’ or profitable months are gone by second half of 2017.. Do you think this might be due to you 😉 Just thinking – if your approach helps me to find a system, everyone else could do the same and the edge will be gone sooner than later… 🙁 ?!?!

    1. Hi Chris, have you read the article 2017-18 Winter League Report – 35k in 138 Days? From the 10 monitored systems 8 underperformed and 2 overperformed but in the end, the portfolio hit the target. The 2 systems that overperformed were whole-season systems.

      However, this isn’t actually the reason.

      The main reason for the good performance was that these two systems contained the largest number of expected bets; Germany 57 and Italy 116.

      There were two other systems with over 50 bets in the portfolio (Austria and the EPL) that didn’t do so badly but the systems with fewer bets were far too volatile to deliver reliable results.

      Therefore, please have a look at the profitable systems you identified and check whether the groups are actually big enough to make any judgements.

      Answering your question… It cannot be caused by ‘us’ that the market doesn’t have an edge anymore. Although there are a few punters that follow our advice and bet successfully the ones that see it through from the beginning to the end are just a handful not thousands. And just a few punters that find an edge and use it don’t change the market. There are hundreds of bookmakers and thousands of matches to play every month.

      🙂

        1. Hi Chris, I didn’t mean that you need to be ‘big’ enough; the systems in your portfolio though, have to be. In addition, you have to diversify between at least 5 (even better 10) leagues.

          Here’s an article about diversification and risk management: Judging the Risk of a Football Betting Portfolio.

          Do you know that article? Is your portfolio of bets compliant with the advice given in that article?

          1. yea, I know what you mean and yes I have read it all.

            I just wouldn’t consider a system if it has turned into red for the last 6 months despite it being overall, all things considered, a positive (+70% ROI!) and significant (+2k bets) system since 2013 – I would only put a single system into the portfolio if it has proven itself within the last 5 months as well – otherwise it might be a sign of a market characteristic that has simply changed by now.

            Argh – it’s just sad for this particular case (have you seen that graph..), as this looked so promising haha..

            I will find other ones though 🙂

          2. Hi Chris,

            when you search for systems you will hardly find any that performed positively five seasons in-a-row. There is often at least one year in the red and sometimes another year with a very low profit. But it’s the combination of the systems, in other words, their synergy that makes a portfolio strong.

            I was trying to make a point in the many articles that I wrote that you must not judge each system individually but always look at the whole portfolio. If the graph shows one system only then it may be actually worthwhile to include it in the 2018/19 portfolio.

            The problem is that with lower probabilities (higher odds), which make a 1X2 betting system viable, there will always be a substantial up and down within each individual system.

            I hope this makes sense and I wish you good luck!

  3. Hi

    Just to double check this example. Are the odds referring to the First Half Odds market?
    Is this data included in the sheet?

    Thanks
    Tony

    1. Thanks for your kind words, Martin.

      Yes, use Oddsportal unless indicated otherwise in the Notes tab of each HDAFU table.

      Set your list of bookmakers in Oddsportal to resemble ours and use the highest odds (according to the timestamps) when analysing games for inclusion.

      Hope this is self-explanatory and thanks for your question.

  4. Hi

    Just wanted to touch base and find out whether anyone was able to make a profit this season – Winter Leagues.

    Unfortunately, I had to bail out at the half way mark due to the terrible runs in all the systems. I was running quite a few, and all stacked up very well.

    Not sure if it is VAR affecting things, and prices have certainly been adjusted.

    I have a separate underdog system.that finished in profit, but not as high as expected.

    Also the Jupiler odds were slashed this season compares to last!

    Very frustrating.

    1. Hi Mike,

      Thanks for staying in touch and for sharing your experience.

      Yes, the bookmakers are always one step ahead of the game and slashed the Belgian odds across the board in 2018-19 because they could see suspicious betting patterns. We’ve all suffered because of this and the corruption investigation into the Jupiler League continues as I write, with an outcome expected in early June.

      Regarding the portfolios, again, smaller profits than expected, with some systems closed down before their scheduled finish. Summer Leagues have started well, so watch this space…

  5. Hi Elena

    It has been a while. I have been wanting to ask how the Tables are performing since VAR introduction as my portfolio suffered and from my communication with you last year, it was perhaps related or so Robert thought.

    I have noticed some odds have been lowered across all the major leagues as well.

    Is there an updated review that I can read, or perhaps you can comment on?

    Thank you in advance

    1. Hi Mike,

      Whilst VAR has certainly affected the in-play trading process on betting exchanges, I haven’t really noticed its effect on full-time results.

      To be honest, with the HDAFU systems we employ, I never bother following the matches. It is just a question of identifying and placing the bets and then rounding up the results at the end of the day or even later sometimes. I never even know whether VAR has played a part in any of the matches.

      By coincidence, there is a full 2019 Summer League Campaign Report on the way, so watch this space over the next day or so for the summary.

      Thanks for taking the time and trouble to contact us again.

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