Monday 4th December 2006

The horse racing was a bit of a non event for me today. I did try to trade in almost all the 21 UK races but only got matched in 6 of them. I must be getting slow in my old age. The first I traded in was the 12:10 at Lingfield where I had a straight lay on Davidia for £8 @ 9.50. In the 13:30 at Wolverhampton I backed Fantasy Defender for £13 @ evens about two furlongs out only to see him beaten in the final furlong and was not able to trade out. I thought I had cracked it in the 13:50 at Fakenham where I backed Avalon for £200 @ 2.90 about 1 mile out when McCoy had his mount going well and about 4to 5 lengths in front. I layed £200 @ 2.25 within 20 seconds so had myself a £130 profit if he won. When it became apparent that Avalon would not win I only managed to lay off another £10 @ 2.33 so I was left with a £10 profit, quite disappointing considering the position was in and, in hind sight, I should have layed more off earlier. In the Next at Wolverhampton, the 14:30 I had a straight lay on Rowanbeery for £25 @ 7.00 and duly won the £25. I had two other very small trades before it was time to do the school run so I missed the rest of the days races. So I ended the racing day with a profit of £31.

Tonight's football match, in Stuart Pearce's words, was ' a good old fashioned game' between Man City and Watford. I did my normal analysis of this match using the facts and stats on the SoccerSATS.com site and realised this was to be a great opportunity to bet the unders. I have used one of their tables of stats below which clearly shows that with Man city averaging just 1.00 goal at home and Watford averaging only 0.42 goals away from home, this was as likely to be an under 2.5 goal match than many you would come across, therefore an ideal match to trade on, or, if this is what you do, take an outright position on the unders.

	Home goals		Away goals		Overall goals
	For	Against	For	Against	For	Against
Arsenal	2.00	0.50	1.28	1.14	1.66	0.80
Aston Villa	1.50	0.87	0.87	1.00	1.18	0.93
Blackburn	1.25	1.12	0.50	1.33	0.92	1.21
Bolton	1.00	0.87	0.87	1.00	0.93	0.93
Charlton	0.71	1.00	0.75	2.00	0.73	1.53
Chelsea	2.00	0.42	1.37	0.62	1.66	0.53
Everton	1.62	0.62	0.87	1.25	1.25	0.93
Fulham	0.87	0.87	1.12	2.00	1.00	1.43
Liverpool	1.75	0.37	0.62	1.50	1.18	0.93
Man United	2.12	0.37	2.25	0.62	2.18	0.50
Manchester City	1.00	0.14	0.75	2.00	0.86	1.13
Middlesbrough	0.87	1.12	0.71	1.42	0.80	1.26
Newcastle	0.85	1.00	0.42	1.14	0.64	1.07
Portsmouth	1.75	0.75	0.87	1.00	1.31	0.87
Reading	1.37	1.12	0.85	1.28	1.13	1.20
Sheffield Utd.	1.12	1.37	0.25	1.12	0.68	1.25
Tottenham	1.42	0.71	0.37	1.75	0.86	1.26
Watford	1.00	1.00	0.42	1.85	0.71	1.42
West Ham United	1.14	0.85	0.25	1.50	0.66	1.20
Wigan Athletic	1.42	1.42	1.00	1.42	1.21	1.42

I started off by backing the unders before kick off for £280 @ 1.73 then in a hurry trying to back more before the kick off with the price already starting to fall managed to lay £200 @ 1.71 instead of backing, not a happy chappy! As soon as the market was reformed at the start of the match I backed another £250 @ 1.65. I then decided with 20 minutes on the clock and a huge wad of £3500 offered @ 1.55 when the market should have been falling quite fast, to back the unders for £1000 @ 1.55. More or less as soon as I had taken this the market dropped and I layed back £500 @ 1.50. I then took my time laying off in £50 chunks to get all out of my liability and just at half time greened up with a profit of £160+ both sides. In the second half I was able to sit back and enjoy a game with no pressure and just waited for a goal to enable me to get back into the market, but a goal never came so I ended with a £161 profit for my 45 minutes work. This left me with a respectable £192 profit for the day. I feel like a part timer due to lack of trading today.

Comments

[ramps]

I yesterday experimented with the betdaq in running. I ran a small experiment where I did the same thing in betfair just after I had done them in betdaq. Often I got matched in befair but not in betdaq. I just wondered why you choose betdaq over betfair, you might find you make more money with the greater liquidity in betfair. Or maybe you making more because of less liquidity I am not sure but for the time being I looking at both very carefully.

[Ray]

Hi Brian,
I must admit that I had a very slow day yesterday, but this day in December is normally very slow as all the main sports writers have a huge bash on. I have always had success on Betdaq which was not the case when I used only Befair and I like to see atleast two strong exchanges on the go. A lot of people complain about the Betfair customer services, think what they would be like with no competition. I have always found Betdaq staff to be knowledgeable and courteous. I do use Betfair at times but just prefer the Betdaq set up.
Good Luck
Ray

[Nathan]

Hi Ray
You were not alone with your mistake on Avalon. I backed at 3.40 and layed of in-running 2.20 but found myself holding on too long instead of greening up straight away at around evs. It's the McCoy factor me thinks. Good Luck.

[Rob]

Ray,

I have sent you an email separately.

Do you use any sort of staking plan for your football bets?

Rob

[Ray]

HiRob,
Thanks for the email. I don't really use a staking plan as I will normally just take anything on offer if I think the price is right. I have looked at using a staking plan on my football trading as I have a very high strike rate and could therefore probably make a lot more money by staking properly. It is something I would take advice on.
Ray

[shawn]

hi have read ur blog with great interest and respect... but i have a question which i hope u would advise me.
By backing the under 2.5, what if a goal is scored early? do u trade out for a lost or keep waiting? what if while u are waiting another goal is scored? how will u do in such sitution? thanks mate

[Ray]

Hi Shaun,
If a goal is scored early I would normally back the unders again and then again if a second goal is score. I don't play in matches where I think a lot of goals could be scored early, i.e. Man U, Chelsea,or Arsenal at home against teams in the bottom half of the league. But I may trade in these games after a goal depending on how the match is going as with these type of games and with a goal scored the odds are quite often very high and therefore will drop quickly giving me a chance of backing the laying off fairly quickly. I hope this helps .It is not an exact science and I do get caught sometimes with losses, but as long as I can keep my strike rate high I can take the odd loss.
Ray

[Rob]

Ray,

I am a big fan of the Kelly Criterion. It is very effective if you are a good judge of value. I presume you have heard of it but if not it is a plan that, assuming your judgement of value is reasonably accurate, uses a mathematical formula to grow your money at the fastest possble rate. In essence, you place more money on backs that you feel are priced very high than you would if the price was only slightly high according to a precise protocol. Backs are calculated according to your betting bank which may be an issue as far as liquidity goes.

That is a gross over simplification of the plan. Do a google search for a more detailed description.

Rob