Tag: American Football betting

Super Bowl contestants’ strengths, weaknesses and recent history analysed

Posted on by Online Betting Pro

The countdown is on to Super Bowl LI and the bookmakers have made the New England Patriots clear favourites to beat the Atlanta Falcons. But this should prove to be a ferocious battle between the league’s best offence and its best defence and it really could go either way. It promises to be a great game, and we have compiled some essential information to arm yourself with before placing your wager:

Form

Without a doubt, New England has been the best team in the league this season. They were without Tom Brady for the first four games due to suspension but still went on to finish 14-2 in the regular season. New England simply breezed the playoffs, winning by 18 points in the Divisional Round and 19 points in the Conference Championship. Atlanta won their final four games of the regular season to finish 11-5 and qualify as second seeds to the playoffs. They also annihilated the competition, winning by 16 points and then 23 points despite facing two very tricky opponents.

Strengths

The Falcons have had by far and away the best offence in the league this season. In fact, their regular season offensive record is the eighth best in the history of the NFL, with 33.8 points per game. In the playoffs they kept it going, beating the Seahawks 36-20 and the Packers 44-21. New England has the league’s best defence by a considerable distance. They gave up just 15.6 points per game in the regular season, so it really is a case of unstoppable force meets immovable object.

Weaknesses

Atlanta’s defence has not been great this season. It caused them to lose five games in the regular season, and even when they were winning they were conceding a lot of points and scraping victories thanks to the strength of their offence. But their defensive form improved considerably in the playoffs and they kept two excellent offences relatively quiet. For the Patriots, there are no real weaknesses. Their defence is superb, but so is their offence. The only worry for Pats fans might be the absence of Rob Gronkowski, the record-breaking tight end who misses the game through injury.

Star Players

Leading the charge for New England is Brady, widely accepted as the best quarterback of all time. He has the experience, having led his team to seven Super Bowls, winning three of them, and he has the skill to take this questionable Falcons defence apart. Defensively, Malcolm Butler and Ron Ninkovich will make life extremely difficult for the Falcons. Atlanta’s star is undoubtedly Matt Ryan. He led the Falcons to 580 regular season points, putting them 71 clear of the second best team offensively, the Saints, and he did it with exceptional consistency and stats that lead all QBs in the league this season. But he has a lot of help from Julio Jones, who is arguably the best wide receiver in the NFL and a key part of this offence.

Key clashes

The obvious clash is between the league’s two outstanding QBs. Ryan leads Brady in passing yards, passing touchdowns and pass completion this season, but Brady has that vital experience and has a higher all-time passer rating. The clash that determines it could be Butler v Jones. Butler has shut down many of the league’s best wide receivers this season and if he does a similar job on Jones the Super Bowl is New England’s. This is old hat for Pats coach Bill Belichick, coaching his seventh Super Bowl, and he has great tactical nous, but Falcons coach Dan Quinn will come at him, and that is the best way to take on New England, so it should prove a tremendous tactical battle.

History

What can the history books tell us about who might win this game? While Atlanta is the league’s hottest team right now, the Pats are historically the best team in the business. Belichick and Brady can be trusted in the big games, while there are more question marks over Ryan and Quinn. In four previous games, Brady has never lost to the Falcons, so he goes in with the perfect record. The Pats should win but expect a tight game. The favourite failed to cover the spread in five of Brady-Belichick’s six previous Super Bowls, and if you are looking at spread betting history is with Atlanta (who are -3), as the underdog has covered the spread in 13 of the past 16 Super Bowls.

Packers v Falcons Looks Set to be a High-scoring Thriller

Posted on by Online Betting Pro

There are just four teams left standing in the NFL playoffs and they are only one game away from the Super Bowl. On Sunday the NFC and AFC champions will be crowned before they go on to meet at Super Bowl LI in Houston, Texas, on February 5. Both conference championship bouts promise to be enthralling contests and first up is the NFC Conference game, which sees the Green Bay Packers travel to the Atlanta Falcons.

Green Bay Packers

The big story of the divisional round was Green Bay’s stunning win on the road against NFC top seeds the Dallas Cowboys. Dallas had by far and away the best record in the NFC and were overwhelming favourites to win the conference. But they came up against a Green Bay side that had become the league’s form team, closing out the regular season with a six-game winning streak to finish 10-6 and qualify for the playoffs as fourth seeds at the top of their division, before thumping the heavily fancied New York Giants 38-13 in the Wildcard Round. Their clash with Dallas was epic, tied at 31-31 with 12 seconds to go when Green Bay QB Aaron Rodgers threw a 36-yard pass to Jared Cook, who tapped both feet on the ground before falling out of bounds, leaving Mason Crosby to step up for a 51-yard field goal to seal a 34-31 win. Rodgers played out of his skin, leaving his teammates and the opposition in awe with that final pass. Green Bay will be a formidable opponent for the Falcons on Sunday.

Atlanta Falcons

Atlanta has had a more straightforward route to the conference final. They finished the regular season on 11-6 to end up as second seed and get a bye for the Wildcard Round. They faced a difficult divisional game against the Seahawks but benefited from home advantage – Seattle to Atlanta is a long old trip – and won it comfortably. The 36-20 highlighted the supreme talents of Falcons QB Matt Ryan, and it will be a fascinating clash between him and Rodgers.

Projections

Atlanta will have expected a trip to Dallas to take on the conference favourites, but instead they have home field advantage and host a banged up Green Bay team. It is, however, full of danger and surging with confidence after eight straight wins. It looks set to be a classic. During the regular season, Rodgers and Ryan were ranked one and two for the most touchdown passes, with 40 and 38 respectively, and they are arguably the two most in-form quarterbacks in the NFL at present. These teams met in week eight, when Rodgers and Ryan combined for seven touchdown passes and 534 yards, so it should be a thriller. On that day, the Falcons won 33-32, and it could prove equally close here.

Green Bay are much improved since then and did fantastically well to beat Dallas without Jordy Nelson. But the Falcons are also improving and have the league’s best offence. Both of them are poor defensively and superb in offence, so it should be a high scoring game and the 4/6 Sky Bet is offering on over 57.5 points looks good. If Nelson returns it will provide a great boost for the Packers, but even if he does not get over his injury (cracked ribs) Rodgers has proved that he can throw to anyone and he has the postseason experience to lead the Packers to a victory against the odds.

The Packers are real outsiders here, at 15/8 with Sky Bet and Paddy Power, while the Falcons are 1/2 with Stan James. In all likelihood, it will be a lot closer than that and the Packers could well spring a surprise. If they do lose, it should only be by a slender margin and that makes them look good to cover the spread, so the 5/6 Bet365 is offering on Green Bay +5.5 looks fantastic.

NFL playoffs: Steelers and Texans favourites in AFC Wildcard Round

Posted on by Online Betting Pro

NFL fans have been treated to an exciting regular season full of twists and turns, but we are now moving into the business end of the season: the playoffs. We start with the Wildcard Round, which sees the two division winners with the lowest win records in each conference take on the two best runners-up. In the AFC the Houston Texans host the injury-hit Oakland Raiders in the first game, while the in-form Pittsburgh Steelers have home advantage against the Miami Dolphins.

Oakland Raiders at Houston Texans

It was all going so well for Oakland as they qualified for the postseason for the first time since 2002. But then they were rocked by the injury to star quarterback Derek Carr, who suffered a broken fibula and was ruled out indefinitely, and the odds on them winning the Super Bowl plummeted accordingly. In their last regular season game, Carr’s replacement Matt McGroin was hit by a shoulder injury, and they finished with rookie Connor Cook as QB. It cost them as they slumped to a 24-6 defeat against the Broncos, who were on a long losing streak and already eliminated. That caused them to slip from first to second in the AFC West as the Kansas City Chiefs won to leapfrog them at the death, so they go into the Wildcard Round after slipping from number two seed to number five and have to face the Texans, who finished 9-7 to win the AFC South and claim the number four seed despite having a worse record than the Raiders.

Without Carr, nobody is giving the Raiders much of a chance. They beat the Texans in week 11, but the teams are looking very different now. The Texans are 1.55 with Boyle Sport and that looks a good price, considering how depleted the Raiders are. The Texans’ quarterback situation is a bit uncertain too, as Tom Savage left Sunday’s game with a knock and Brock Osweiler came back in, so you might want to see who the starting quarterbacks are before placing your bet, but the Texans should cover a -3.5 spread at 10/11 with Bet365 if Cook starts. If they can’t beat a third string rookie quarterback, Houston fans will go ballistic.

Miami Dolphins at Pittsburgh Steelers

The Steelers are on a sensational seven-game winning streak and have been made third-favourites for the Super Bowl at 17/2 with Paddy Power. Despite that they only finished as third seed in the AFC and have to get through the Wildcard Round against the sixth-seeded team, the Dolphins, who finished 10-6 in the AFC East. The Steelers are on a roll and should be far too strong for Miami, who were crushed 35-14 by the New England Patriots in their last game. The Miami defence was run ragged and the offence was constantly under pressure, so the fans will not be full of optimism ahead of the trip to Pittsburgh.

Having said that, the Dolphins did beat the Steelers 30-15 in week 6, but a lot has changed since then and the Steelers have looked outstanding in their seven-match winning run. That is borne out in the odds, with the Dolphins huge outsiders at 7/2 with the likes of William Hill and Bet365, and Pittsburgh as low as 1/5 but best priced at 4/17 with 888 Sport and Unibet. The Steelers should win this one comfortably and that looks a good one for any accumulator bets. Injuries are looking good for the Steelers as Ben Roethlisberger, Antonio Brown and Le’Veon Bell will play a postseason game together for the first time, while Miami’s defence is banged up and quarterback Ryan Tannehill – who put the Steelers to the sword in week 6 – is also injured. The spread on the Steelers is -9.5, a huge favouritism, and while they may not quite cover that they should win this one fairly comfortably.