USFC Final Antrim v Tyrone Clones 19th July

[A Quinn Martin Production]

Ladbrokes

Tyrone 1/16
Antrim 15/2

[longball]

CJ wasnt on for the hurlers yday. I sometimes dont understand betting if tyrone are 1-16 surely Antrim should be 16-1 in a two horse race?

[TacadoirArdMhacha]

CJ wasnt on for the hurlers yday. I sometimes dont understand betting if tyrone are 1-16 surely Antrim should be 16-1 in a two horse race?

Have you ever seen a poor bookmaker? The difference between what a team "should be (in this case 16/1 as you point out) and what they are is basically the margin that the bookie is keeping for himself.

[A Quinn Martin Production]

CJ wasnt on for the hurlers yday. I sometimes dont understand betting if tyrone are 1-16 surely Antrim should be 16-1 in a two horse race?

Think CJ was on the bench yesterday.  Our Nail Loney is yer man to explain how odds are set!

[tyssam5]

Ladbrokes

Tyrone 1/16
Antrim 15/2

Antrim to win this one, Tyrone players to enter the back-door competition with pockets full after a Yellow Sam-esque betting coup!

[ONeill]

Here's Gerry Adams' take on it from his blog:

THE LONG ROAD TO CLONES.

Aaaaaaahhhhhhhh!!! What joy! What sheer unadulterated totally wonderful bloody joy! What a game! What a team! What a victory. I saw it in the Fiddlers Green Pub in San Francisco just before our big Unite Ireland Forum. Me and Mairtín óg and Benny and Richard. At 11 0 clock in the morning. We were joined by Paul and Seamus from Tir Éoghan. They comported themselves with the grace of princely Gaels. All Ireland champions. And they didn't mind who knew it.

Seamus is a good hearted young man from Coalisland. Paul a much older dude from the same parish. Paul told us maybe we would be better going some where else for coffee instead of wasting our time thinking we could beat Cavan. I told him we had our sights on Croke Park in September. Seamus laughed.

I told him the old joke about Peter Canavan. You know the one? From the era before Tyrone were the Champions? When they were like Antrim.

'What's the difference between Peter Canavan and a Falls Road black taxi?'

'A black taxi can only carry six passengers'.

Seamus stopped laughing.

'I see your point.' Said Paul.

'You'll see lots more points in the next seventy minutes' I shot back at him.

We can win, I told myself. This time we can win. Other times in the football we drew the big hitters in Ulster but Cavan was doable. All winners need a wee bit of luck sometimes. Our luck was the luck of the draw. A game against Cavan. A winnable game. I could hardly dare to believe it. But I did. Win. We could win. Antrim could get through to the Ulster Final.

There were two Cavan people at the table behind us. A man and his young son. A couple from Kerry and some Galway folk on high stools at the bar. Me and the Cavan duo wished each other luck. Then the game started.

I can't remember the detail of it. I need to see it again. A hundred times over. We started slowly as I recall. Cavan were more assertive. They had more possession. But their first effort at a score was a wide. That looked promising. Then another few wides and I felt that things could turn out ok. My confidence grew. Even though we were on the defensive.

Then we started to exert ourselves. The rest is a blur. I remember screaming a lot. And shouting advice. To Terry O Neill. And Tom McCann. And Niall McKeever. And Kevin Brady.

At half time Maírtín óg ordered a fry. Bacon, sausages, black and white pudding, soda and potato bread. I ate half of it on him as Paddy Cunningham stroked over a point or two. Seamus ordered a fry as well. I ate most of that on him also as Cavan came back at us in the second half. He didn't seem to mind. I could see he was impressed by the Antrim backs. I was lucky we weren't drinking. A Coalisland man and his drink would not be so easily parted.

'We need to watch out for the soft goal. A sneaky goal wud have us in trouble' I announced to no one in particular but in the hope that the Aontroim defenders were listening.

Paul agreed.

'Five points is nothing in football'.

I could have done without that observation, true and all as it might be.

How many times were we here before? Ahead. Playing like demons. Then our focus goes, our coherency disappears, we stutter and stop playing as a team. We get overwhelmed. We lose.

'Up Antrim' I screamed. 'C'mon lads. Aontroim abú. Youse can f***ing do it'.

Seamus looked at me disapprovingly. Then Cavan scored the goal.

The Cavan duo behind us applauded like men gone mad.

I never flinched. I was back in the Falls Park playing for Saint Finian's against Saint Galls. I was nine. Saint Galls had just scored a goal. I was left half back. Seán Loughran's quick kick out found me. I went off on a long penetrating solo run before sending a perfect soaring ball forward. Failey Magee fielded it perfectly. He got a point. The winning point. The next day in the back row of Brother Christopher's class me and Seán Loughran discussed how we would win two All Irelands for Antrim. For hurling as well as football.

So Cavan's goal didn't rattle me. But I had fifty one years of almost being an All Star to re assure me. Minnie Mo who texted me every five minutes from Clones broke. She couldn't watch the rest. And all the while Saint Finians Under Tens were alive and well and running at the Cavan defenders like deer. And then Paddy Cunningham gave us another point.

Two minutes into injury time and all Cavan needed was another goal. But I never gave up hope. My heart stopped a few times but the sight of our team playing like dervishes revived me. At least seven times. And then the ref blew it up.

AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!

I phoned our Gearóid at Clones. On the mobile. He was jubilant. I was crying.

'Youse have no chance against us' Seamus declared as we left the Fiddlers Green.

But I could see he was shook.

'See you in Clones Seamus' I said.

'Once every thirty nine years isn't bad' he retorted.

'There was a war in between' I reminded him.

'You can't fight a war and play football' Richard cut in.

And he should know.

'Remember the black taxi' I said ' I love Tír Éoghan but.......'

'I know' said Paul. 'It's all on the day.'

Paul is right. Which is strange in itself. But I have to agree.

As David told Goliath, anything can happen on the day.

Aontroim - Ulster Hurling Champions.

Aontroim - Ulster Football Champions.

See you in Clones.

[Our Nail Loney]

CJ wasnt on for the hurlers yday. I sometimes dont understand betting if tyrone are 1-16 surely Antrim should be 16-1 in a two horse race?

You need to factor in the price of the draw as well longball

Though this could be the outright one??

Whatever market, a bookie sets the odds and then adds on a percentage to the prices where they make their profits...

A fair book would be 100% but most odds set would add up to 130% (the 30% being the profit the bookie makes if all horses are backed)

Take whatever Antrim are plus in the handicap, you know rightly the Tyrone panel will have it backed to the hilt!!

Explained better here:

The book percentage (or "overround") is defined by the Racing Post as the "sum of the quoted probabilities across all horses in a race". The bookmakers assign each horse a probability of winning, represented by its odds. The percentage of the "book" represented by particular odds can be calculated by adding one to the odds and dividing the resultant figure into 100. For example:

Evens: 100 / (1+1) = 50%
2/1: 100 / (2+1) = 33.33%
3/1: 100 / (3+1) = 25%
4/1: 100 / (4+1) = 20%, etc.

Simplistically, the overround is indicates the bookmaker's profitability on a race. If an overround is 125%, then the bookmaker can expect to make a profit of 20% (25/125). However, this profit percentage is dependent on each horse being laid for an amount proportional to their contribution to the total book. For the sake of clarity and simplicity, suppose there is a 5-horse race, in which each competitor has an equal winning chance. In a "fair" market, each would be priced at 4/1, so a bookmaker taking bets of £20 on each horse would have a perfectly matched book. Regardless of the result, he has taken £100 on the race and must pay out £100 on the winner, so cannot lose. However, neither can he win.

In a real racing scenario, it is far more likely that the prices are likely to be, say, 6/4, 2/1, 3/1, 4/1and 7/1. In this case, if the bookie takes bets equal to each horse's contribution to the book percentage, he would like to accept bets of £40 on the 6/4 favourite, £33.33 on the 2/1 chance, £25 at 3/1, £20 at 4/1 and £12.50 at 7/1. In this case, the book overround is 130.83%. The layer's maximum liability is still £100, but has generated turnover of £130.83.A cursory examination appears to indicate that making money from laying horses is a straightforward process. Unfortunately, this is not the case.

As can be seen, the overround concept depends on a perfectly evenly matched book. In reality, this evenness of match is never achieved and the reported "overround" is very often a poor indication of the state of the betting market.

[north down]

Ladbrokes

Tyrone 1/16
Antrim 15/2

What to hell would Ladbrokes know did they not sponsor Derry?

I'm sure Antrim will put up a great fight but Tyrone will prevail in the end.

[Our Nail Loney]

Can we assume Antrim will have 31 counties support in the final?

[Archie Mitchell]

Can we assume Antrim will have 31 counties support in the final?

Id say so. You for going Our Nail saying as Down are in the minor final?

[Maguire01]

Can we assume Antrim will have 31 counties support in the final?

Bar those who'll have money on Tyrone presumably!

[Doohicky]

Can we assume Antrim will have 31 counties support in the final?

I had thought this, until my Dublin friend told me he was supporting Tyrone.

When asked why, he said because it kept us in the other side of the draw and he wanted to avoid us.
I'd imagine there are others with the same idea.
Of course, if this was a straight knockout at this stage, then yes, there would be 31 counties supporting Antrim.

[ardmhachaabu]

their midfield is immensely better than Tyrone's,

and how do you work that one out??

Kevin Hughes.2003 AIF MoM
Enda McGinley 2008...all star MF

versus........................................................

with the exception of the derry win i hadn't seen hughes catch anything all year, or very little.  MH may have a gameplan for a player who catches every ball coming into the middle anywhere close to him coz he will need it after seeing the no. 11 for Saffrons, he caught every ball coming in to him.

Other thing I noticed about Antrim i had forgotten to mention... they can tackle like the best of them.

Complacent Tyronies beware.

[gaagaa]

And the bould CJ didn't even stay to celebrate.  He was out the gates quicker than i was.

what a loser

[Norf Tyrone]

What province is in the same half of the QF draw with Ulster the year?