St Johnstone vs Kilmarnock

Scottish Premiership · Sun 02 Aug 2026, 14:00
St Johnstone
1.53–1.13expected goals
Kilmarnock
St Johnstone
45%
Draw
28%
Kilmarnock
27%
Most likely score by result
If St Johnstone 1-0 · 10% · 10.4If draw 1-1 · 13% · 7.6If Kilmarnock 0-1 · 7% · 14.6
Full scoreline distribution
1-113.1% · 7.61-09.6% · 10.42-19.2% · 10.82-08.2% · 12.30-08.0% · 12.50-16.9% · 14.61-26.9% · 14.62-25.2% · 19.1
Exact scores are low-probability by nature — the single likeliest scoreline here is only 13%, and these eight cover 67% of outcomes between them.
How this is modelled. Dixon-Coles Poisson with ridge-penalised attack and defence ratings, exponential time decay and a low-score correction, fitted on five seasons of Scottish league results, with a shots-on-target proxy blended into the expected-goals estimate. Early in a season the fit pools all four Scottish divisions, because promoted and relegated clubs have no record in their new division; it shifts to a division-specific fit once the season has its own data. Backtesting on both match result and exact scoreline showed that schedule beats either fixed choice.
These are model probabilities for information only, not betting advice. In walk-forward testing on a held-out season this model did not beat bookmaker prices — flat-stake betting on its disagreements lost money. It is published as a calibrated forecast, not an edge.