Never Tell Me the Odds: The Stingy Odds for Leicester City to Win the English Premier League

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Published: Nov 1, 2018
DOI: https://doi.org/10.5750/jpm.v12i1.1447
Keywords:
English Premier League football season championship betting sentimentality in betting markets lotteries long-shots

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Matthew Hood
Texas State University
William Chittenden
Texas State University
R. Todd Jewell
Texas State University

Abstract

The crowning of Leicester City FC as English Premier League champions in 2016 is arguably the biggest upset in the history of professional sports. The pre-season odds posted for LCFC to win the EPL were 5,000:1, worse than finding Elvis alive. In our model, they win just once per 70,000 simulations; thus, bettors could expect a return of just 0.071 of the stake when betting on Leicester City. This is similar to the expected return of betting on all of the long-shots in our simulations; however, the expected value of bets on favorites averages 0.864. We find that the betting market is segmented for favorites and long-shots; while the market for favorites resembles a normal betting market, the market for long-shots is like a lottery.

Article Details

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Vol. 12 No. 1 (2018)
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Articles

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