Better Days

After alot of thinking following my previous post I decided that its easier just not being an idiot and sticking to a relatively successful strategy instead of trying to be a hero and go for the kamikaze approach. As said in the last post I decided to take a step back from the usual amounts that I bet and instead just start with €100 and go from there. Well it was actually 105 I think!

The results were extremely encouraging for a number of reasons: I had to somehow find more value than I usually would because of the lower amount I was playing around with; I had to be disciplined as some of the matches turned out to be slightly unpredictable; and most importantly the amount that I won in the last 7 days is a profit that I would be delighted with when using a bank of 300-500 instead of 100. As mentioned in one of my previous posts though, if you think you are half decent at this gambling lark then you should be able to make a good profit without needing a big bank! Mistakes will inevitably come at some stage as they always seem to do but I've definitely progressed in the last few weeks compared to the naivety I was showing at the start of the season.

Cant really say that everything went totally to plan. Anzhi last minute equaliser (after they conceded on 88 mins) was slightly fortunate and also Utd were holding on big time against Stoke after that Crouch goal. Utd and Madrid were almost the exact same odds on Tuesday night at around 1.22ish which was a bit mad. Utd having a slight injury crisis and Basle are very underrated. Although at 2-0 at half time who would have complained??? Compare this to Madrid who practically had a full squad to choose from bar 2 injuries against an Ajax side that has been cack athis season and who lost to this Madrid side twice last season home and away.

Was happyish to take the 1.18 on Barca yesterday morning? Was this value? Well yes to me it was. Barca needing to get a win on the board after the Milan debacle. Pep said he was going to pick a strong side and also BATE are SPL standard which usually helps when backing a team at crap odds. Think Barca were around 1.14/1.15 by kick off anyway... Was tempted to go Barca -1 but the only concern was that Peps away record in Europe is one of the only blots in an otherwise exemplary managerial copybook. They rarely win away as comfortably in Europe as you'd assume... That doesnt really matter though when they could probably beat a combined 11 featuring Jesus, Moses, The Incredible Hulk and Chuck Norris 4-0 at the Camp Nou (unless of course AC Milan come to town, feckers). Good luck everyone!

Just Not Good Enough

Ok, dont get me wrong here and there are times in the last few years where I would have given my left nut to see any sort of profit come out of 30 days of graft but this time its just not good enough. 2 weeks ago I was up nearly a grand and then just completely went awol after a smallish loss on the Roma match. Lost discipline? Dirty chase? Clueless mug? Yes probably all 3!


I just dont understand myself sometimes... When everything is going so well, the strategies are paying off, trading provides profit and then I just start lumping on for no reason??? Its the gamblers graveyard when you behave like that. Im not going to say its down to hard luck because its not. Teams arent going to win every week... Mugs like AC Milan are allowed to score last minute equalisers, even at the Nou Camp! 40 mins to trade out for a nice profit was plenty. It was just a lack of self control and greed. Losses will come, thats inevitable. Its the traders job to minimise the loss to the best of their ability and then proceed with caution next time, not act the lunatic because you're pissed off with yourself.


We've been here before but after nearly 4 years I was hoping bad habits would have all been erased by now. The old "I lost but Im having fun" just doesnt do it any more and losing is never fun anyway. Taking a sort of break from things this weekend but will still play around with a couple of things, just not as heavy.


I've also realised how much your personal life can affect your decision making process and if you dont have a clear head you'll have an empty bank! So I've left the girlfriend of the last 11 months to focus more on my job firstly and also to make a better shot at trading. It wasnt just for those 2 reasons. There were a million reasons why leaving was the right choice and I do feel relieved that the whole episode is over.


As for the betdaq challenge, I reached 100ish before going back down to 29 and getting it up to 40 and I've withdrawn it now. Betdaq is rather poor. Liquidity is gash, functionality inefficient and I just didnt enjoy the experiment. Made a solid tenner though... We can celebrate that tonight. To Arthur!!!


As a separate "challenge" to my usual trading I'll be doing a €100-??? sort of thing just to see where it takes me. Good luck everyone and lets keep our heads screwed on tightly for a change! Cheers!

Betdaq €30 Challenge

Decided to sign up for Betdaq a few weeks ago as they were giving me a free €30 bet. Actually you have to lodge €30 and if you lose that bet they refund you apparently.... Who knows whether they actually do or not. 11 bets later and Im up to €83. Its weird, at times Im just so loose with my betfair bank but with the betdaq Im scrapping for my life and protecting it more than I've ever protected my betfair cash. I suppose there is a bit of satisfaction building up a small bank and once you set yourself a challenge you will do whatever it takes to succeed with it.

I've been posting my results on twitter just to keep my tweets sort of interesting but I think it would be more beneficial if I posted my selections first rather than just being an aftertiming tit! Would love to break the 3 figure mark and go from there. No point withdrawing money anyway as the initial investment was 30 squid. Thats the beauty of it! If it goes it goes, no harm done really. But the more I build it up the more I feel I have to win! Crrrazy....

Its something I've always wanted to do along with the bumpy old betfair ride which already has my blood pressure through the roof over the past 3 weeks (I will get to all that in another post). I think if you're good enough you should be able to make money regardless of your bank. I used to think you need 1.5k plus to make decent money but as the blog has gone on Im realising that 300-500 is plenty if your selections are good enough. And if you're really good (which Im not) then probably 200! Everybody has different opinions on how much you need but it also depends on your financial circumstances and other commitments as well but for now the betdaq challenge continues......

New Season Same Old Spanish Story

Madrid win 6-0 away and Barca win 5-0 at home.... Have we seen this before? Its just the same old story in Spain. At least in England it can be argued that its a 3 horse race but it really is just a scrap between Madrid and Barca in Spain.

Finding "value" in these matches will be tricky. Madrid were 1.31 and Barca were 1.22 and after the first week of results those odds can be considered generous. I think we will be seeing barca at 1.07ish most weeks at the Nou Camp so if you think someone can give them a game then lay away and good luck! Goals will be the most likely way to go but even those markets will be correcting themselves now! I was happy to take on the over 1.5 goals market last night and was delighted to be done with it by half time. Also had a couple of small bets on the tennis yesterday but in the first round of slams the odds tend to be gash!

The weekend was nice and relaxed on the betting front with nothing causing me huge concern. Lay l'arse at OT and sit back and watch them lose 8-2 was a pleasing way to spend a Sunday afternoon. Also stole a few quid on Chelsea and Liverpool on Saturday. Was disappointed to see that Serie A had gone on strike. Its my favourite league to bet on!

Word from the moaning Federer is that the courts are playing very slow at Flushing Meadows. This will suit Nole and Murray the most and should help Nadal as well. Its bad for Rog I think but we'll see how he progresses. As much as I hate to admit it, but if his head is right, the value is with Muzza. But I've seen Nadal pull the "play gash before the grand slam, turn up and win it" trick a few times before, particularly when its not the clay season.

Patience!

Ok then. How was the Summer for you all? Mine was a bit mental and apart from a few bets which I mentioned on the last post I did nothing whatsoever on the gambling front. I think a bit of time off was needed. My head was just fried from last season and this was a Summer where no major football tournaments were going on so I took advantage of the rest time.

One thing I did learn (and yes I should know this already) is that patience is everything. There were so many tennis matches in particular that I watched over the Summer where waiting and waiting and waiting (you get the idea) before making your move would have paid dividends. I used to be a pre match lumper and hope for the best sort of guy when it came to the tennis but that approach is simply tragic. When you are depending on just one player to bring home the money, you just have to wait to see how things are going before taking part... This was my approach to the Murray Djoker match on Sunday and worked well so hopefully I can get involved in the US Open but it wont be the madness that it was last year..... I hope.....

Sticking to the patience theme, I didnt have a single bet on the first weekend of the premiership. Everything just looked filthy and I wanted to see how teams would start. Chelsea at Stoke, l'arse at Newcastle, Villa at Fulham, Utd at West Brom! No thanks to all of those. Its a cautious time because surely people are hoping to start the season with a bang by nailing a few big wins, its really not the time for it yet. I've been playing around with correct score and match odds for matchday 2 and its worked well. Those are my 2 main (only) strategies at the moment. I felt the 0-0 in the Utd Spurs match was way overpriced at 16.5 and was able to trade that. I did the same for the Liverpool l'arse match. Its a favorable trading market because the prices are big. You just have to hope you make the right moves. Im happy notching up 20 and 30 euro here and there and over the course of a week it can really add up. There is more value in match odds but I feel more secure in correct score. Like being caught between a wife and a mistress.... We will keep the mistress on speed dial for now!

Alot of talk on the forums about moving to Betdaq. Im still loyal to betfair for now. Lets compare the liquidity in a specific market for the two "exchange". Udinese V L'arse tonight: Betdaq €50,000 matched, Betfair €504,000 matched... Its an easy choice for now. Happy gambling!

Returning!

And we're back. Apologies for not posting anything last month but a mixture of returning back to college, plagiarising my final project, a slight pregnancy scare and pretending to work has kept me too busy to do anything on the gambling front until this week.

Always a strange feeling when the Summer hits. The amount of tennis is exciting and I've gotten back the enjoyment of watching test match cricket but in truth football is what its all about for me and thats gone for the next few months so its disappointing. Got my champions league outright winnings which was pleasing. Dear me how good are Barca? For Utd to get to 1-1 at half time was an achievement in itself. The problem is they will be terrible odds in most matches next season and in the outright markets. Anyway we'll cross that bridge when we come to it. As a Utd fan getting to 19 titles  was excellent and even getting to the Champions League final was good but never enjoyable when your team gets absolutely destroyed. All talk from David Gill is that Utd are going to have a busy Summer. We'll wait and see.....

Onto the tennis this week. Didnt do anything at all in the first week of the French Open. The schedule makes it very difficult to trade during work. Layed Troicki when he was serving for the match (seen it all before, Viktor playing well and then choking when its crunch time). And then backed Rafa against Soderling. Honestly 1.37 for Rafa in a quarter final at RG against Sodertart who has had an average season. If Rafa had lost and they were playing again tomorrow I'd still back at that price.

Alot of talk on the various blogs about backing 1.01. Green All Over, Gambler Falls and Sport is Made for Betting all giving excellent views. I must admit that I've been there before and more than once I have watched in horror as I've been taken to the cleaners by a "dead cert!". Its all about mindset. The arguement of "if you have 1000 why risk it all for a tenner" is a good one but gambling is impulsive. Do any of us really need to do it? Some perhaps. If we were rational and intelligent all the time then we would probably close our betfair accounts and call it a day. The availability of a 1.01 leads people into thinking that its a definite winner and as such they risk the large sum for measly returns imo.  Of course this has to come off 100 times before you breakeven which in itself is tougher than finding good value bets. But Im not against it. If someone thinks 1.01 is value then good luck to them and I dont take any pleasure in 1.01's getting destroyed because if you're only enjoyment from betting is watching others doing their conkers then you are a bit of a tit. Everybody has lost before so we all know what it feels like. Most people learn (probably the hard way) that its not worth the torment in the long run. Good luck everyone! Cheers.

Champions League Outright Part Three

And we're all done with the outright market and it looks very satisfactory indeed. Dont want to take any chances so decided to go even on all 4 teams even though it looks like a Utd Barca final. Apologies for the lack of updates over the past couple of weeks but I've been taking a break due to an extremely strained relationship with my other half and I have a big project to do as part of my diploma....

Hoping to get back on the horse this weekend and looking forward to hopefully having a good one! I've been reading around the various blogs and everyone seems to be doing ok at the moment so lets hope we can have a good end to the season and a great Summer! A good post on punting versus trading by denman as well. Good luck everyone! Cheers!