Football betting - How important is the first goal in the match?

Every player has the same common trait as the other ones (And no, it is not connected with their lavish lifestyle with beautiful women and fast cars - or the other way around). It does not matter whether he plays in a Sunday league club in some small village or plays in front of thousands of fans in top football league. Whatever their skills, nationality or age, wherever they are, they always share the same excuse for their mistakes and misfortunes. And what is interesting, 99% of all cases will not blame their visit to the casino on 4 am, or the mixed sauce kebab eaten last night and definitely not the nameday party of their mate Bob, which got out of hand a little bit and got quite hardcore!

No! It is all the fault of the referee who was definitely biased and on the rival team side, or it is the fault of the badly prepared pitch or the weird, suspicious set of events that happened on the field on which they had absolutely no influence. Because, for the love of God, who would expect that a goal conceded in the fourth minute of the match will be the biggest obstacle and difficulty in winning that game?!!!

Look through Your memory, when was the last time, that You have heard the defender of Your team saying that: “It was the first goal that changed the course of the match”? or “The goal scored quickly at the beginning of the game killed the match”? It does not matter that the first goal was scored at the beginning of the game and there is still more than 80 minutes to level the scores. The first goal killed the game and that is it!

Let us therefore check, how much truth is in that statement. Does it really get impossible to come back after losing one goal? How often does the team that scored the first goal, win the match at the end? Finally, how can You use Your, knowledge, statistics and Your judgement skills in order to place a winning bet on football?

Let us analyse the richest and second best football league in the world - English Premier League. What is important, Premier League is not only the richest, and one of the best football leagues in the world, it is one of the most competitive ones. Even though Spanish La Liga is considered the best football league in the world, Premier League is definitely the most exciting one. In England, You can expect the unexpected, a ton of brutal fouls, scores shifting in few seconds from one way to another and constantly surprising results. Yes, Premier League is definitely a perfect example for this article. Leicester City surprising success few years ago is the perfect example how the team which battled against relegation in one season won the Premier League title in the next one. English Premier League is definitely the one causing the most heart-attacks and pushing people into heights of their emotions.

We have studied the last seven seasons of the Premier League between 2010 and 2017 and we must admit that the statistics that we encountered surprised even us. As it turns out, in this highly competitive football league, 69% of all teams that opened the scoresheet, were the ones who won the match at the final whistle! To put it simply, the team that first scored a goal in a match, won 7/10 of its football games. Only in the case of 19% of all cases, the match ended with a draw and barely 12% of all team managed to swing around the result to their own advantage and win it, despite losing the first goal.

It seems that having this knowledge will be very easy to predict the scores and place a Live bet at any online bookmaker. All it would take is to watch any football match and at the moment when the weaker team manages to score the first goal of the match, place a bet for their win in the game - the odds for such occurrence will still surely be very good, and according to the statistics, there is 90% chances that the team we placed the bet will not lose! In reality, it is not so much, and there are a number of reasons for that.

There are number of factors that influence the final result of the match and whether a team can managed to defend their good result up until the final whistle of the referee, they include:

• Quality and reputation of the team
• Phase of the season
• Place of playing the match (Home/Away)
• The time of scoring the first goal

When it comes to the quality, level of skill and reputation of the teams, there should be no problem understanding that. It is definitely easier for a top-class team to defend the score until the end of the match than a team that is battling against the relegation to the lower division. Numbers? Of course, here are the statistics. In the already mentioned period of seven seasons of the English Premier League, the teams from the top four places of the table won 80% of their matches, in which they first scored a goal. 14% of these games ended up as draws and only 6% of times, the weaker team managed to overthrow the giants and won with the team that scored first. It is completely different on the other side of the table where the four weakest teams from the already mentioned period of the seven season of the English Premier League between 2010 and 2017 managed to win only 51% of the games that they have scored the first goal. Furthermore, in only 6% of all cases, these teams somehow managed to change the course of the game and win it, despite losing the first goal.

Undoubtedly, the phase of the season has a major influence on defending the good result in the match. In the first few match weeks, the managers do not focus that much on the tactics and discipline as in the last few matches of the season. Usually, the last few games of the season are decisive and teams need to do their best to fight for the championships, place in the continental cups or from the other side of the table, for their life and future in the top division. At that moment, there is no place for joking around and not playing on 100% and coming back from the bad result such as losing the first goal of the match is definitely much harder than at the start of the season.

To answer this question, we have analysed 380 matches of the English Premier League 2011 / 2012 season. The results of the study clearly shows that the home team has won almost 71% of the games that they scored the first goal on, while drawing the 17% of such matches and losing about 12%. From the other hand, the away teams lose in 61% of the cases where they were the ones that lost the first goal, drew 26% of such games and won only 13% of the matches in which they lost the first goal but still managed to win with the home team.

Matches that the home teams have scored first goal

Matches that the away teams have scored first goal

Let us therefore check, what is the influence of the number of games with the first scored goal on the final place in the league table? Do teams, that more frequently opened the scores in the match, end up on higher positions in the league table? There is no doubt, that yes, they do. In the 2014/2015 season of the English Premier League, the title was decided in the final match of the league season in which the Sergio Aguero goal gave Manchester City their League Championship Trophy. A regular person not interested in sports or sports betting, will say that they were simply lucky, but we all know there was more to it and the final success of the Roberto Mancini team was not an fluke or accident.

The Citizens opened up the scoresheet in 29 out of their all 38 games in that season of the Premier League. What is more, they scored the first goal in 17 out of 19 games played at their home stadium (Which, by the way, they won all of them, 100% accuracy). From the other hand, they scored the first goal in 12 out of 19 games in the away matches (75% of all of them they won).
 

Matches that the team have scored first goal

Another crucial thing is the question asked above. Which moment of scoring a goal is the most important for the final result of the match. From one hand, the goal at the beginning of the game gives the rival team the time to properly react and recuperate the bad result. From the other hand, the goal in the end usually kills the game and decides which team wins the match. Obviously, as we already mentioned, it looks slightly different when comparing the home and away teams. The chances for the win of the home team are always much higher.

Final result when the home team have scored first goal (including time of the first goal)

Final result when the away team have scored first goal (including time of the first goal)

To sum up, the statistics do not lie. The first goal of the game has a huge impact on the final result of the football match. It should come as no surprise in the case of first goal scored in the result of, for example 1:0 in the, let’s say, 85 minute of the game. The percentage of teams that have scored in the last 15 minutes of the football match should really make You think. One way or another, we advise all punters to consider this statistics and read this betting tutorial which can definitely help to place more winning bets, both Live bets and pre-match ones. Furthermore, such knowledge is a precious material for the professional punters who want to be successful in their sports betting.