Round Five - a Hawks v Cats cracker

If in doubt pick the home teams this week - except Brisbane.  That is the advice from the model this week; with three anticipated close games, three middling and three worthy of a streak tip (although throwing in GWS and West Coast but not Melbourne who are all on the cusp of the models streak tip criteria)

Flexi tips allocating 50pts on the Hawks over the Cats (feature game); 30 points on the Roos over the Bombers (two teams the model consider very similar) and 20 points for the Pies over Brisbane at the Gabba.

Feature game: Hawks v Cats

The model is anticipating a very close game with the Hawks being victorious by a point (with less scoring shots but a higher accuracy): both tams to score in the 90's.

The model has had a good run with a ten game MAE of 25pts (including a blowout in early 2017 which saw Geelong win by 86pts).  The model has tipped 8 winners out of the last 10 games (all of these games have been at the MCG)

Geelong have been trending higher scores in the last 5 games (only 7 of the 20 scores have been over 100).  The Hawks defense may prove the defining difference - perform poorly and lose; perform well and win.  This is quite evident when comparing the trend graphs for both teams and Geelong shade Hawthorn with accuracy in the short term but not in the long term trends.

Game could go either way but I am sticking with the gutsy 1 point prediction for the Hawks (and putting 50 flexi points on the game also!).  I have a bottle of Chimay Bleue to enjoy while watching from home in Adelaide.