A quick post

I've not posted for a few days again and I've not traded either. Life is currently pretty hectic! My day job is going to be crazy busy till Christmas, but I'm going to post whenever I get the chance. My plan is to get some trades in on the weekend. Get back to the horses again. Yay!

My flirt with football wasn't particularly great and I never really got much of an edge. I will keep looking into it, but until I know what I'm doing with football, I'll not be throwing cash at it.

Edges

I got a comment yesterday that got me thinking. I had talked about a football match I had traded on and how it had been a bit hectic and the commenter (sorry, you didn't leave a name) pointed out how I had no edge with my football trade. He was spot on and it was a reawakening. I had just been playing around, thinking I knew best, with nothing to base it on. I had been lucky and making a few profits there but if I carried on that way I was due a fall, so many thanks there.

So I have been thinking about the idea of an edge and how you need to have a plan or method or some rules to work to in order to avoid taking a big hit. On horse racing, I feel pretty happy, in that I have a few different methods I use, depending on the state of the market, i.e. the time till the off, the volatility, trending, etc. Sometimes I will just try and scalp ticks, using the price momentum as a guide, which can work quite well (although, as I mentioned in a previous post, I have been caught out a couple of times, usually when trying to take one trade too many. Hopefully, lesson learnt). On the football side of things, I need to do more research. I feel I'm going to have to also just try some ideas out, with small stakes, as paper trading really doesn't give you a good indication of when/if your back/lay will be matched, which is important.

Your edge then is what potential advantage you have over the other punters out there. That could be a knowledge of how the market moves in relation to certain events (e.g. WOM) or it could be based on an analysis of the fundamentals (form, determining price value) or the psychology of the "crowd" (e.g. over/under response to news of events) and also the discipline/rules you trade with (stop losses, when to get in, when to get out). Having no edge=drifting on the tides of chance.

Any comments, as always, are welcome (even if they are pointing out what I have done wrong!).

USA v Brazil scares

I was attempting to trade on the USA V Brazil match yesterday. I was on the edge of my seat. I wasn't watching the match, but I had my eyes glued to the computer screen. I didn't play this event in the best possible way. I was rather undisciplined and a bit random, but I was so sure it would be a Brazil walk over that I didn't consider the full risks. Anyway, I'm sure some of you will tick me off, but I'll say what I did and leave it at that.

Firstly I compared the pre-match odds in Betfair to a couple of bookies and saw that the price for backing Brazil was higher in Betfair and was rising till near the kick off. I took a back there. I expected the odds to drop within the first few minutes and I then intended to lay it off. I also thought the game would be a sure win, so I entered a lay on the draw too.

Well, all started okay, the odds for Brazil started dropping but I let it carry on dropping, planning on getting out when Brazil score. It didn't work that way, the USA went 1 - 0 up. The Brazil odds shot up and the draw odds dropped down. Oops! I managed to hedge myself with a back on the USA and then Brazil scored and then scored again, which changed the odds and I was able to lock in a trade on the draw part. Because I had took a loss earlier with the USA goal, I had cut my profit potential right down and I was okay, as long as it wasn't a draw. Then just near the end, the USA equalised. This was my worst case scenario and would result with me coming out with a loss. The instant before I got out of the loss, Brazil got another one in and everything was okay. So, I got less than a fivers profit but the way things jumped around really showed me how much I have got to learn with football.

I managed to have a go on the horses prior to the football, but I got caught out with a big turn around which wiped out the profit I had built with several trades. Really annoying.

An ass at Football

I thought that I had football sussed out and was going to make some consistent profits. What an arrogant tosser. Nope. I still have a lot to learn. I was trading on the Motherwell v Hearts match in the under 2.5 goals market and after looking at past stats and a bit of research, I thought there would be a couple of goals. I know too little about football to get confident here, but I was. I was too over confident to think and decide on a price to get out of the trade at. So after a few scalp trades which gave me a few ticks profit, I put on a lay, expecting a goal and the price to jump up. The price began slowly dropping and I watched as it approached my lay price. I thought, should I just get out here and re-lay at the lower price? But, no, I didn't, I just thought "any minute now, a goal will be scored and the price will jump up". It didn't. It kept dropping. I don't know why I was so convinced another goal would come in. I think I'll stop trying to predict results, or at least make sure I have an exit plan first.

Greedy boy gets nothing

Well, I got a few horse racing trades in but the trades that have hacked me off, mainly due to not learning the lesson of not being too greedy is one of the football matches I traded on. I traded on Almeria v Valencia. I checked out the stats and saw that they had no score when they last met and expected the under 2.5 goals to drop in price, so I backed it early, then layed it after 10 or so minutes. I then attempted to scalp some ticks, laying first, in case a goal was scored. Whilst doing that, a goal was scored. The market suspended and when it re-opened the prices had shot up and I was able to close the trade out for a nice profit. This is where I then got greedy. I thought the game would continue and end up at 1 - 0 or 1 - 1 maximum, so I left my "free bet" as it were, and moved on. The game ended 2 - 1, so I got nothing. I could have greened up and come out nicely. Nope. I was greedy. Hopefully, I have finally learnt that one. It's a funny old game.

Tonights results

Well, there the last races of the day were later today, so I got to trade on a couple. I would have got onto more but my wife has become addicted to Facebook and I couldn't get her off the computer! I didn't do bad, but I didn't do great either. The first race, I ended up taking a small loss and the second a small profit, so I pretty much stayed where I started. On the second one I had built up a few quid from repeated trades, just taking a tick here and there, but the price was pretty high and so the green up amount was low. I thought, as it was the favourite, it might lower in-play. Nah, it went out the running pretty quick and I struggled to get anything. A lesson against being greedy. Lots of people have said, not to go in-play, even if it is to green up and that is a good example why. Still, if I hadn't been greedy I would have got a better price in-play, if I had got out sooner. Though hind sight is a wonderful thing with 20/20 vision!

There was no in-play football on in time for me to get in at the start, which is part of my plan. So, not a lot happening again. I need to make up for it this weekend.

Football is different

My last few posts seemed to have mainly been links to useful web sites. Well, not wanting to disappoint(!), here is another one. I found it useful for finding out quickly when football matches are kicking off and what the scores are. It updates itself every few minutes and although not something to rely on, I found it helpful. Go to http://www.livescore.com/

I did a few trades on the match between Blackburn and MyPa. I started off pretty well, but ended just a couple of quid up, was lucky not to lose anything, as I didn't think it through beforehand. I was in the under/over 2.5 goal markets. I learnt a fair bit with this game. I've been trying to treat football markets similarly to how I have been treating horse racing, because that's been all I've known, but they are worlds apart. The horse racing markets all get lively around 10 minutes before the off until a couple of minutes before, when they go a bit crazy. The football markets are not that lively before the off and then you are in the world of in-play betting. In-play on the horses seemed to jump all over the place and was not a very safe place to be. The football in-play teases you with obvious trends to scalp but there is always the risk of a goal happening and making the price jump like crazy. You can go in technically, i.e. just using the numbers, scalping a chunk of ticks at a time, as the price follows a steadily developing trend, but the market gives and it takes away. You could be lucky and get a nice group of trades done and be able to green up, then again, a goal could be scored and you have an open trade and be looking at a loss. I've come to the conclusion that to play football in-play, you need to look at the fundamentals first, i.e. to get an idea of how the game may pan out and have a plan of what you will do from the start.

Feels like being back at square one

I feel like a beginner again! I'm trying to trade on football, as I am usually not around in time to catch the horse racing at the moment. I keep making school boy level errors and it is costing me money. Last night, I set up some lays prior to kick off and then found that there was no in-play betting on that match! What a fool! Lesson painfully learnt. Can't believe I'm publicly admitting my stupidity!

On a more positive note, here is a website/forum that has a lot of useful betting/trading threads/comments/info, http://www.punterslounge.com/forum/