Everton versus Watford is the surprise home banker for the first weekend of the new football season according to AccaTracker, the football betting app run by major affiliate group Team FA.
Over 14% of people’s football accumulators from this weekend include the match at Goodison Park, as punters suspect that the newly promoted side will be easily toppled by Roberto Martinez’s men. Going into Friday evening, the match has edged in front of the more obvious accumulator banker of Chelsea v Swansea, which the champions won at a canter 4-2 last season. However that is reflected in the stingy 2/5 available on the home team, which probably makes Everton’s odds of 3/4 slightly more enticing, despite the Toffeemen’s faltering form last season.
Other matches with a strong presence in people’s accumulators coming into this weekend are Norwich’s opener against Crystal Palace, Spurs’ visit to Old Trafford and, lower down the football pyramid, Hull’s Championship match against Huddersfield.
Team FA Marketing Director Tim Pindar commented: “It’s always fun to try and pick out any patterns in people’s accumulators going into a new season, given the limited amount of form that we have to go off. Punters tend to anticipate newly promoted sides to struggle and recently relegated sides to thrive at a lower standard. It doesn’t always work that way of course, but it’s an understandable way to bet.”
AccaTracker –stats
Matches selected by individual AccaTracker users and the percentage of accumulators that incorporate those matches
Unique Users | Bets | |
Everton v Watford | 14% | 14% |
Chelsea v Swansea | 12% | 12% |
Norwich v Crystal Palace | 10% | 10% |
Man Utd v Tottenham | 10% | 10% |
Hull v Huddersfield | 10% | 10% |
Bournemouth v Aston Villa | 9% | 10% |
Leicester v Sunderland | 7% | 7% |
Bolton v Derby | 7% | 7% |
Charlton v QPR | 5% | 5% |
Blackburn v Wolves | 5% | 4% |
Brentford v Ipswich | 4% | 4% |
Leeds v Burnley | 3% | 2% |
Birmingham v Reading | 2% | 2% |
Cardiff v Fulham | 2% | 3% |
‘Accatracker has been downloaded over 750,000 times, and is the only Uk betting app to be listed as a ‘Featured App Store Favourite’