METHOD
How I tip: one rating per club, one price per side, and every miss left in
Every tip on The Footy Slip comes from the same method: a rating for each NRL and AFL club, a home edge, and a formula that turns the expected margin into a price. Below are the settings I chose before looking at 2026, what the ratings can't see, and the full back-test, round by round, so you can judge a $1.85 tip on its record rather than on trust.
The rating: one number per club
Each club has a rating in points. At the start of 2026 every club was on zero. After each game I compare the margin the ratings expected with the margin on the scoreboard. The winner's rating moves by a fixed share of that gap, and the loser's moves by the same amount the other way.
So a club that wins by 30 when I expected 10 gains more than a club that scrapes home by 2 when I expected 12. Beating expectations is what lifts a rating; winning ugly as a favourite can lower it.
The settings, fixed before the season
| Setting | NRL | AFL | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|
| Share of the gap | 0.1 | 0.08 | How far one result moves a rating |
| Home edge | 2 | 3 | Points for playing at your own ground |
| Travel | +2 | +7 | Extra home edge when the visitor comes from another city (NRL) or state (AFL) |
| Spread | 9 | 21 | How quickly a points gap becomes a big chance |
| Margin cap | 40 | 90 | Blowouts count no more than this |
These are round, ordinary values for a points rating, chosen before I ran a single 2026 game. I haven't tuned them on 2026, because a model tuned on the games it reports will always look better than it is.
From rating to price
For any game, the expected margin is the home side's rating, minus the away side's, plus the home edge. The margin becomes a chance with one formula: chance = 1 ÷ (1 + e−margin ÷ spread). My price is 1 ÷ chance.
An expected margin of zero is a 50% chance and a $2.00 price on both sides. In the NRL, a 9-point edge is about 73%, or $1.37. In the AFL, where the spread is 21, the same 73% needs about a 21-point edge. My two prices on a game add up to exactly 100%; a bookie's add up to more, and the extra is its margin, explained in how betting odds work.
What the ratings can't see
- Team lists, injuries and suspensions. A side missing its halves pairing is rated as if it were full strength.
- Weather, short turnarounds, byes and long travel beyond crossing a city or state line.
- State of Origin weeks, when NRL clubs lose players for a round.
- Late-season motivation: a side locked into a finals spot is rated like any other.
A bookie's market knows all of this within minutes. That is why I treat a big gap between my price and the market as a question to answer, not a bet to place.
How I use the prices
TIP on a card marks the side my ratings make more likely to win. For betting, the question is different: is a bookie paying more than my price? If I have the Sharks at $1.24 and a bookie offers $1.20, the bookie is paying less than I think the side is worth. I would pass, even though the Sharks are my tip.
I keep most multis to two or three legs, because a bookie's margin multiplies with every leg you add. The worked examples are on NRL multi tips.
The 2026 back-test, round by round
For each game the ratings made a call using only results from before that game. These are not picks I posted at the time; they show how the method would have gone. Draws are left out of the totals.
NRL: 128 of 212 (60%)
| Round | Right | Games | Biggest miss (winner at my price) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Round 1 | 5 | 8 | Panthers $2.56 |
| Round 2 | 3 | 8 | Eels $2.67 |
| Round 3 | 3 | 8 | Broncos $6.00 |
| Round 4 | 2 | 8 | Wests Tigers $4.03 |
| Round 5 | 5 | 8 | Sea Eagles $2.76 |
| Round 6 | 2 | 8 | Bulldogs $4.73 |
| Round 7 | 5 | 8 | Broncos $3.91 |
| Round 8 | 7 | 8 | Rabbitohs $2.09 |
| Round 9 | 4 | 8 | Raiders $3.55 |
| Round 10 | 6 | 8 | Eels $4.84 |
| Round 11 | 6 | 8 | Cowboys $2.91 |
| Round 12 | 4 | 5 | Bulldogs $2.32 |
| Round 13 | 3 | 7 | Dragons $6.06 |
| Round 14 | 7 | 8 | Titans $2.46 |
| Round 15 | 4 | 5 | Sharks $3.78 |
| Round 16 | 4 | 7 | Titans $5.25 |
| Round 17 | 6 | 8 | Cowboys $4.27 |
| Round 18 | 2 | 5 | Eels $5.45 |
| Round 19 | 4 | 7 | Cowboys $3.97 |
| Round 20 | 5 | 8 | Broncos $14.57 |
| Round 21 | 6 | 8 | Bulldogs $3.51 |
| Round 22 | 7 | 8 | Bulldogs $2.67 |
| Round 23 | 5 | 8 | Dragons $9.34 |
| Round 24 | 5 | 8 | Raiders $5.52 |
| Round 25 | 5 | 8 | Wests Tigers $15.33 |
| Round 26 | 6 | 8 | Eels $3.97 |
| Round 27 | 4 | 8 | Broncos $6.29 |
| Finals Week 1 | 2 | 4 | Knights $3.70 |
| Finals Week 2 | 1 | 2 | Knights $4.67 |
| Finals Week 3 | 0 | 2 | Knights $3.61 |
AFL: 146 of 215 (68%)
| Round | Right | Games | Biggest miss (winner at my price) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Opening Round | 3 | 5 | Bulldogs $2.61 |
| Round 1 | 6 | 9 | Crows $2.70 |
| Round 2 | 4 | 7 | Saints $2.43 |
| Round 3 | 4 | 7 | Eagles $2.92 |
| Round 4 | 4 | 8 | Dockers $2.26 |
| Round 5 | 6 | 9 | Saints $3.35 |
| Round 6 | 8 | 9 | Cats $2.07 |
| Round 7 | 6 | 9 | Giants $2.52 |
| Round 8 | 6 | 9 | Tigers $2.93 |
| Round 9 | 7 | 9 | Bulldogs $3.55 |
| Round 10 | 6 | 9 | Cats $2.54 |
| Round 11 | 4 | 9 | Blues $3.15 |
| Round 12 | 4 | 7 | Blues $3.21 |
| Round 13 | 4 | 8 | Bulldogs $3.34 |
| Round 14 | 6 | 7 | Crows $2.19 |
| Round 15 | 4 | 7 | Blues $3.13 |
| Round 16 | 5 | 7 | Power $2.62 |
| Round 17 | 5 | 9 | Lions $3.77 |
| Round 18 | 9 | 9 | none |
| Round 19 | 6 | 9 | Bombers $4.27 |
| Round 20 | 8 | 9 | Magpies $3.84 |
| Round 21 | 6 | 9 | Blues $2.68 |
| Round 22 | 5 | 9 | Kangaroos $2.68 |
| Round 23 | 7 | 9 | none |
| Round 24 | 6 | 9 | Suns $3.57 |
| Wildcard Finals | 1 | 2 | Blues $2.16 |
| Qualifying & Elimination Finals | 3 | 4 | Hawks $3.09 |
| Semi Finals | 2 | 2 | none |
| Preliminary Finals | 0 | 2 | Dockers $3.33 |
| Grand Final | 1 | 1 | none |
What changes for 2027
Starting everyone on zero cost the ratings in the first nine rounds of 2026. For 2027 each club will start on two-thirds of its end-of-2026 rating, and the Perth Bears, with no games behind them, will start 5 points below average. I'll publish those starting numbers before Round 1.
The results themselves come from the NRL's and the AFL's own published draws and scores, checked on the dates listed under Sources. Where a number on this site comes from a bookie, the page says which bookie and when the price was taken.
Questions punters ask
Are your prices better than a bookie's odds?
Why did the ratings do worse early in the season?
Do you change the settings when the ratings get it wrong?
Do you take team lists and injuries into account?
Tips, ratings and prices for NRL and AFL
Published · Last checked
What I did for this page: ran the ratings over every completed 2026 NRL and AFL game and published each round of the back-test (checked 29 September 2026). Not done yet: the NRL Grand Final on 4 October, and the 2027 starting ratings.
How I tip · Sources for this page · How we make money. A bookie's commission doesn't change my ratings, my prices or the order of bookies.
Read next
- NRL tips: every club's rating and the matchup calculator
- AFL tips: every club's rating and the matchup calculator
- How betting odds work: prices, chances and margins
- How we make money, and what that doesn't change
Sources
- NRL 2026 draw and results: nrl.com/draw/?competition=111&season=2026, checked 28 September 2026.
- AFL 2026 fixture and results: afl.com.au/fixture, checked 28 September 2026.