NIFL Premiership · Friday, 25 September 2026. Final score 1–3 (half-time 0–2). Before kick-off we rated it 51% under 2.5 goals — the match finished with 4, so that call missed. That rating was frozen into a version-controlled ledger before the game and has not been touched since.
Open this match in the app →| Market | Yes | No | Our call |
|---|---|---|---|
| Over 2.5 goals | 52% | 48% | Over |
| Over 3.5 goals | 28% | 72% | no pick |
| Both teams to score | 50% | 50% | No |
The result model puts Coleraine FC at 49%, the draw at 28% and Linfield at 23%, from expected goals of 1.4 and 0.88.
The league sets the starting point. NIFL Premiership has produced over 2.5 goals in 56% of its matches, and that is where a team with no record of its own would sit.
Each side's own record. Coleraine FC have 5 in 8 this season (2 of 4 at home), Linfield 2 in 8 (0 of 3 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 57% and 48%.
Last season still counts, briefly. With 8 and 8 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 58% and 51%.
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 55%.
Head to head. These sides have met 11 times in three years, producing over 2.5 goals in 73%. 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 56%.
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 40%, from expected goals of 1.4 for Coleraine FC and 0.88 for Linfield. Folding in 30% of that view gives 51%.
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 52%.
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.
| Team | Games | O2.5 | O3.5 | BTTS |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Coleraine FC | 8 | 63% | 38% | 50% |
| Linfield | 8 | 25% | 0% | 25% |
More: Coleraine FC season stats · Linfield season stats · NIFL Premiership table and form. Ratings are calibrated probabilities, not tips — a 60% call is expected to miss two times in five.