Game Rating / Opponent Matching

Wondering if anyone has any insight into how the opponent matching works or how accurate the individual game rating is.

I'm rated around the 1000 mark at the minute and am finding it hard to progress despite the game rating consistently telling me that I'm playing above my rating.

I've looked at my last 50 games (33% wins and 64% losses) and in that time my average individual game rating is 1387 (1555 when I win and 1310 when I lose).

In the games I've lost, my opponents average game rating is 1638 yet they're all players rated from probably 950-1150.

Seems crazy to me how I seem to have to play so far above my level in order to win.

I have a friend with a similar rating to mine (950-1000) and his game rating in his last 4 wins are 850/900/800/850. I haven't won a game with a game rating below 1100 in absolutely ages. 

Would there be any validity to the theory that the engine matches you against opponents based on how well they are playing and not just based on their rating?

The post game rating estimates aren't really accurate.

The pairing algorithm looks at ratings, not things like streaks or anything else like that.

I don't know. 
Kind of agree that the game rating feature must be a load of crap but even the accuracy, how can one player rated around 1000 be winning games with accuracy of around 65 yet another gets beat almost every time they're below 80 or sometimes even in the 80s.
Should be playing against opponents of the same level. Makes no sense.

In the last two games I played, it said both me and my opponent played in the 1300-1400 range. We're definitely not in that range, and it will be a long time before we are.

At the same time, I've had plenty of awful games where we apparently both played like a <400 player. Everyone has good days and...embarrassing ones.

Before you play a game you are able to set a rating range for your opponents. This might be helpful if you are trying to grind elo.

I don't want to try to game the system or anything. 
My point is more that I seem to have to play so much better for wins than my friend who's at a similar level.
My friends accuracy in their last 4 wins, 68.2, 68.3, 63.7, 66.5, 65.5.
I have to look back 27 wins before I find one with an accuracy below 70.
As my original post said, done a bit of analysis on my most recent 50 games, of which I've lost 62%, and the average accuracy when I lose is 75.41 (82.17 when I win).
Yet a friend who's within 50 rating points is winning games with accuracy in the 60s.
It just makes no sense to me.

Ratings are based on past performances but any given rating does not necessarily mean the players are of similar skills in all areas.

A rating is a combination of different skills and person that plays flawlessly but slowly and ends up in time trouble and blunders in endgames or loses in time in better positions candidates be the same rating as someone that plays worse, from an accuracy standpoint, but wins on time and catches late game blunders more successfully.