Sport Boys v Cienciano — prediction, stats and goal analysis

Primera Division · Sunday, 23 August 2026. Final score 5–1 (half-time 3–1). Rebuilt from the season as it stood that morning, our rating would have been 48% for over 2.5 goals. This match is older than our frozen ratings ledger, which keeps 30 days, so that figure is a reconstruction from pre-match data rather than a number we published at the time — a distinction worth making, because only the frozen ones prove what we actually said beforehand.

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Our ratings for this match

MarketYesNoOur call
Over 2.5 goals48%52%Under
Over 3.5 goals26%74%no pick
Both teams to score51%49%Yes

The result model puts Sport Boys at 39%, the draw at 31% and Cienciano at 30%, from expected goals of 1.12 and 0.92.

How we got this number

The league sets the starting point. Primera Division has produced over 2.5 goals in 51% of its matches, and that is where a team with no record of its own would sit.

Each side's own record. Sport Boys have 6 in 22 this season (2 of 11 at home), Cienciano 13 in 22 (6 of 10 away). Those records are pulled toward the league rate with the weight of about 24 matches — enough that two or three unusual games cannot swing a rating — giving 40% and 55%.

Last season still counts, briefly. With 22 and 22 games played this season, last season's rates are still blended in and fade out entirely by game 40 — the point at which our testing showed they stop adding accuracy. A single season is part luck, so each club's record is first pulled toward the league average by 34 games' weight. That moves the two figures to 45% and 54%.

The mix. Weighted 40% home side, 40% away side and 20% league — the split that beat every alternative across 30,582 matches of testing — that gives 50%.

Head to head. These sides have met 6 times in three years, producing over 2.5 goals in 83%. That nudges the number 5% of the way toward the head-to-head pattern — deliberately small, because fixtures change more than reputations do — landing on 52%.

Goal expectation. Separately a Poisson model built from attack and defence strength — using real expected-goals data where the league has it — puts this match at 33%, from expected goals of 1.12 for Sport Boys and 0.92 for Cienciano. Folding in 30% of that view gives 46%.

Calibration. Tested against 97,729 past matches, our ratings below 55% have run consistently too pessimistic — a figure in the high 30s, for instance, has come in about four points higher. So ratings in that range are lifted part-way back, giving 48%.

This breakdown is generated from the same inputs the rating uses, so it cannot describe a calculation we did not perform. The full model is set out in the methodology.

Season form

TeamGamesO2.5O3.5BTTS
Sport Boys2227%18%36%
Cienciano2259%36%59%

Head to head

9 Mar 26Cienciano 3–1 Sport BoysO2.5
18 Sept 25Cienciano 2–2 Sport BoysO2.5
19 Apr 25Sport Boys 2–2 CiencianoO2.5
30 Jul 24Sport Boys 2–0 CiencianoU2.5
18 Feb 24Cienciano 3–2 Sport BoysO2.5
28 Oct 23Sport Boys 2–1 CiencianoO2.5

More: Sport Boys season stats · Cienciano season stats · Primera Division table and form. Ratings are calibrated probabilities, not tips — a 60% call is expected to miss two times in five.