United downs Dynamo to clinch berth in second round

Soccer Betting Lines

11/07/2007 - Manchester, England (Sportsbook Betting Lines) - Manchester United clinched a spot in the second round of the Champions League on Wednesday as the club handled Dynamo Kiev 4-0 at Old Trafford.

Gerard Pique and Carlos Tevez scored six minutes apart in the first half to put the Red Devils out in front, and Wayne Rooney and Cristiano Ronaldo both added goals in the final 15 minutes to keep United alone at the top of Group F.

Dynamo is now winless in its last 11 Champions League matches, and will fail to advance to the knockout round again this year.

United spent plenty of time in the Dynamo half of the field early on, but lacked the final touch to finish off any of their chances.

It was a positive first 30 minutes from the home side, but they didn't move ahead until the 31st minute, when Pique scored his first-ever Champions League goal.

United won a free kick just outside the area on the right. Ronaldo drove the ball into the box and Michael Carrick got his head to it, sending the ball toward goal. Carrick's header hit off the back of Tevez' head, but it caromed to Pique at the back post, and he rose up over a defender and headed it into the right corner.

The Red Devils kept the pressure on the Dynamo defense as Nemanja Vidic sent a header just wide of the right post minutes later, but United's second goal was not far away.

Six minutes after Pique tallied his first Champions League goal, Tevez bagged his as he dropped into the midfield to collect the ball and start a run towards goal.

The Argentine slipped a pass to Rooney, who quickly returned the ball to Tevez, and he fired the ball past keeper Oleksandr Shovkovskiy from the top of the box to give United a two-goal cushion heading into halftime.

United brought backup 'keeper Tomasz Kuszczak on at halftime, and he was tested in the first few minutes but held up well. Dynamo's Diogo Rincon got free at the edge of the area and he ripped a shot that was headed for the right corner of the net, only to be denied by a sprawling Kuszczak.

Dynamo gradually found some more openings in the United defense and came within inches of pulling a goal back on the hour mark.

Marjan Markovic took possession of the ball inside the area on the right and sent a cross through the face of goal for Rincon at the back post. The Dynamo striker lunged for the ball but it was just out of his reach and rolled harmlessly out of play.

Tiberiu Ghioane then forced another good stop from Kuszczak in the 70th minute, but United responded with their third goal of the match to put the result out of reach.

Luis Nani lobbed a perfect ball into the path of Rooney from the right flank. The England international then got to the ball and drove it into the back of the net with a first-time strike from the penalty spot.

Ronaldo then capped the win in style as he carried the ball down the left flank, made a nice move to free himself from a defender, and blasted the ball inside the far post.

In the group's other contest, Roma earned a 2-2 draw with Sporting Lisbon as an own goal from Sporting's Anderson Polga in the 89th minute handed the Italian club a point. Roma remains three points clear of the Portuguese club in second place, but is now five points behind leaders Manchester United.

Barcelona took sole possession of first place in Group E as the Catalan side took care of Rangers 2-0, while Lyon beat Stuttgart 4-2 to move to within one point of Rangers in second place.

Group G saw Inter Milan get two goals each from Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Esteban Cambiasso in the club's 4-2 win over CSKA Moscow, while Turkish side Fenerbahce stayed just one point behind Inter with a 2-0 win against PSV Eindhoven.

Arsenal had a chance to clinch a spot in the knockout round as well, but was held to a 0-0 draw by Slavia Prague, while Sevilla won its third game in four matches as it beat Steau Bucurest 2-0. Arsenal can now clinch a second-round spot with a draw in either of its final two games, while Sevilla can also ensure a knockout-round berth with a win over Arsenal in its next match.

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Sportsbook Betting Lines

Who Makes the Sportsbook Betting Lines?

Las Vegas Sports Consultants (LVSC) is the world’s premier oddsmaking company and the most respected authority on making the lines. Mike Seba is a Senior Oddsmaker at LVSC and has been making lines for the last six years. In our extended interview, Seba explained that there are 4-5 oddsmakers assigned to make lines for each of the major sports (pro & college football and basketball; MLB, NHL, boxing, golf). Each of these oddsmakers bring unique opinions, strengths and weaknesses to the process. Oddsmakers at LVSC are professional sports junkies who love what they do and would probably do it for nothing if you asked them, but they do get paid for it. By necessity their approach is very research-oriented and concise, since with millions of dollars at risk there is little margin for error.

“You either have a passion for it or you don’t,” Seba said.

“The #1 thing for us is to make a line for each game that creates good two-way action. We do this by drawing from past experiences and applying them to current situations. People think it’s much more complicated, but it’s not. “

What are the Football Betting Lines Trying to Accomplish?

There is a common misconception that point spreads represent the oddsmakers’ prediction of how many points the favorite will win by. That is not the case at all – their intent is NOT to evenly split the ATS result between the teams; rather, their goal is to attract equal betting action on both sides. Stated another way, they want to create a line that half the people find appealing to bet one way while the other half find it appealing to bet the other way (known as ‘dividing the action’).

Divided action means the sportsbook is guaranteed a profit on the game because of the fee charged to the bettor (called juice or vig – typically $11 bet to win $10).

How the Opening Line Is Made

The opening line is the first line created by the oddsmakers, which is then sent out to sportsbooks. Of course there is an entire method to the madness on how the opening line is created. Seba explained that it all starts with each oddsmaker creating a line on each game based upon their own personal approach. This usually includes having up-to-date power ratings on each team.

Power ratings are the oddsmaker’s value of each team and are used as a guide to calculate a "preliminary" pointspread on an upcoming game. The power ratings are adjusted after each game a team plays. Examples of non-game factors that would require an adjustment to a team's power rating are key player injuries and player trades.

Once a game’s power rating based pointspread is determined, the oddsmaker will make adjustments to that line after considering each team's most recent games played and previous games played against that opponent. Also, adjustments are made after reading each team’s local newspapers to get a sense of what the coaches & players are thinking going into the game.

Since the oddsmaker’s ultimate goal is equally dividing the sports betting action, public perception and sportsbook betting patterns must be taken into account. For example, the public might have heavy betting interest week after week on a popular college football betting team such as USC. If an oddsmaker comes up with a preliminary line of USC -7, then an adjustment up to -7.5 or -8 would be made in response to the public’s expected USC bias.

The last step in the line-making process for each oddsmaker is taking one final look to determine whether or not the line "feels right." This is where common sense and past experience with how games are bet enters into the picture.

A round-table discussion among the 4-5 oddsmakers involved in making the line for each sport is then conducted and a consensus line is decided upon by the Odds Director before it is released to the sportsbooks. Of the 4-5 oddsmakers, generally the 2 most respected opinions are weighed more heavily by the Odds Director before he decides on the final line.

Why Sports Betting Lines Change

Once the opening line is released by LVSC, the individual sportsbooks decide if they want to make any adjustments before offering it to the public. Reasons for such adjustments include:

Experts working for the individual books having a strong opinion on the game

Individual books having players who consistently bet with certain tendencies (such as an extreme bias toward favorites or toward a certain popular team like USC)

The purpose of these adjustments, like all line adjustments, is to more equally divide the betting action.

Once betting begins, sportsbooks can adjust the line at any time. In doing so they attempt to make more attractive the team that is getting less action. By moving the line, sportsbooks can influence how the public bets on a particular game.

For example, if the pointspread on a game is 7 and most of the money is coming in on the underdog (taking the +7), sportsbooks will then move the number down to 6 ½ to try and attract money on the favorite.

Moving the line is the oddsmaker's effort to balance betting action, and often times such moves can have a major impact on a bettor’s decision. Oddsmakers can also change the line depending on various event-related factors such as player injuries or weather. Obviously, if the line comes out a week ahead of the event (which is the case in football), there is much that could happen during the week leading up to the event that could affect the line. Oddsmakers have to determine if any changes are necessary and send out an "adjusted line."

“The main objective is that our clients get equal action on both sides,” Seba said. “We’re not trying to pick the team that covers the spread, we’re trying to make it a coin flip, a tough decision (for the bettor). If we’ve done that, we’ve done our job.”

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