Croatia 1 England 4

Well that was a surprise wasn't it? I looked long and hard at this match and couldn't really decide if I should adopt any tactic.My take was the following.

Croatia had never been beaten at home and England had just stumbled to a poor win against Andorra. The market seemed to have priced that in already. Also I like going against the grain and most people would have written of an England win so that wasn't a terrible option at the right price. However, looking at the market, a draw was being priced in. The market was discounting just over 2.20 goals. At this level the chance of a draw rises quite considerably. With a patriotic stance bearing on my shoulders I decided not to do anything particular risky and felt this was one to watch.

An expectancy of 2.20 goals is actually pretty low, in fact if you look at all games only around 8-10% would have fewer goals priced in. Taking into account the nature of the match you would expect this particular match to be a few percent up on that; even so a very low number. How fun then that there were five in total!!!! Such is the nature of football that this happens now and again.

So is this the new dawn of English football? Looking at the following stats you would have to say NO. When you dig under the match stats there is no doubt England deserved the win but the emphatic nature is a little flattering. So a new dawn is a premature call in this case, though the confidence boost England have got will bear them well for their next match. Pricing in a higher level of ability on the scoreline, would definitely be an error.