Denman's Betting Journal: The Magic of the Cup

This weekend sees FA Cup action, I make it almost a rule of mine never to get involved on betting in FA Cup games unless there's something that really jumps out at me. The magic of the cup has it is always phased very rings runs true this year. Reading beat Liverpool after extra time at Anfield whilst Leeds United knocked out Manchester United on their own patch. Add to Arsenal's probably slightly less shock exit at the hands of Stoke and all that means the FA Cup is thrown wide open with three of the "Big Four" being knocked out.

Despite my usual absense of betting in the FA Cup I felt this was a perfect opportunity to get involved in the FA Cup outright winners market and I subsequentley backed three team, thoose being Chelsea, Tottenham Hotspur & Fulham.

The backing of Chelsea almost speaks for itself, what with the exits of Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester United they are by far and away the best team in terms of quality left in the competition. They got a very good draw with a home game against Cardiff, can't engage too many problems there but they will be without both Terry & Cole so I wouldn't completely ruleout Cardiff. If Chelsea do progress whoever they come up against they are going to be firm favourites, they've got a fantastic cup record which is another reason for my backing of them.

Secondly I backed Tottenham (prior to the Leeds replay) and thus got a decent price on them (prices matched between 9/1 and 10/1). They are very good team on their day but have had a dip in form over recent weeks. They however will surely be taking the FA Cup very seriously this year and showed that with an impressive win against Leeds United in the replay. They face a Bolton Wanderers side who will surely see Premiership survival as a more important objective this season rather than the FA Cup., hopefully that will mean they'll field a weakened side and mean Spurs can progress.

The final team I backed was Fulham at a nice looking 16/1, this was prior to Notts County knocking Wigan out in the replay. This of course means Fulham will face Notts County on Sunday and surely must be strongly fancied to come through that tie. Looking further into the competition, Fulham will probably need some luck if they are to go all the way as there's still a good number of Premiership sides who are higher in league than Fulham till left in the competition. But Fulham continue to impress under Roy Hodgson, particularly at home where they've beaten Manchester United and Liverpool amongst others this season. Therefore this is going to be my first tip of my blog, Fulham are trading at 14.5 on Betfair and I still think that's good value. If they progress through to the next round and either draw a Championship team or a bottom-half Prmeiership team you could expect their price to be much lower (especially if an other one of the bigger clubs gets knocked out).