Elijah Sanogo vs William Nolan

Highlights

• • Book implied probability for home is ~25%, we estimate ~30%
• • Positive EV of +0.20 (20%) at the current 4.00 price

Pros

• + Current odds (4.00) offer a wide margin above the break-even price (3.333)
• + Nolan's recent small-sample form does not convincingly justify an 82% market price

Cons

• - Very limited and noisy data set for both players increases outcome variance
• - If Nolan's unrecorded form or fitness is better than the published snapshot, the value may evaporate

Details

We find value on the home dog (Elijah Sanogo). The market prices William Nolan at 1.22 (implied win probability ~82%), while the home price of 4.00 implies ~25% chance. The supplied player data shows Nolan with a very small sample and a poor recent record (1-2 in recorded matches on hard courts), which increases uncertainty about an 82% true win probability. Given the thin and mixed form evidence for Nolan and the absence of reliable public information on Sanogo, we conservatively estimate Sanogo's true win probability materially above the market-implied 25% (we estimate ~30%). At decimal 4.00 that produces positive expected value (EV = 0.30*4.00 - 1 = 0.20). Because the bookmaker's pricing appears to strongly favor Nolan despite limited supporting evidence, we consider the 4.00 quote to represent value.

Key factors

• • William Nolan's recent documented form is limited and not dominant (1-2 in sampled matches on hard courts)
• • Book market strongly favors Nolan (1.22) despite thin evidence, creating potential value on the underdog
• • Very limited data on Elijah Sanogo increases model uncertainty but also means favorites may be over-priced