End of May Review

May has been a very intriguing month with two weeks of big profit including my biggest weekly profit of the year so far but also two losing months including last week's hefty loss. Like I said a good day on Monday just about summed up the volatile nature of my profit & loss. In danger of sounding like a broken record here but got to always emphasis it's the long-term picture that is important and not the short-term picture. Therefore I always guard these monthly update as a better guide to my performance than focusing too much on day-to-day or even week-to-week performance.

My profit figure for the month of May totalled £1,145.58, which is a pretty good result in my eyes. Especially since I've had three losing months on the bounce. Overall this means my cumulative loss has been dramatically reduced to under the £150 mark now. Always seemed like a bit of a dumb rule to me but it is said the first target in betting or trading, is to try and break-even first. Right now in the current position I would have actually been better off not placing a single bet this year, but it's probably best not to look at it like that. At least now I'm heading in the right direction, next target is simply to try and get back to break-even and then I'll take it from there.

My favourite song about the month of May to conclude the month with:

It's Just Not Cricket

England recorded a remarkable victory today and bowled out Sri Lanka for 82 in less than 25 overs. Quite remarkable considering the situation and conditions. I was actually watching the play-off final between Swansea & Reading, that was an entertaining event in itself. Therefore I missed most of the cricket in live time. A very good summary of the amazing scene is found on the Gambler Falls blog (inclu. Betfair carnage).

I actually thought today was the end of May, but that isn't actually till tomorrow. So I may as well post my weekly results now, not good news I'm afraid. A rather whooping loss of £601.65 for the week. Although I hasten to add I've had a very profitable Bank Holiday Monday and recovered a sizable amount of that. I shall post my monthly review for May tomorrow evening, I know for certain I'll be in profit and after today's good performance it is going to be sizable. Today again showed me that it's all about the long-term and not about the short-term. I had a large amount of bets today because of all the racing and thankfully I managed to find a good number of winners and a few at tasty prices.

My Betfair "trading" challenge seems to be hitting a dead-end once again. I seem to have been in £10-£20 zone for ages now. Although I often tend to deviate from the trading and end going for outright punts. Should try and stop myself and concentrate on solely trading, but I'm still treating it as a little bit of fun on the side. Although I've got a mini-target of trying to get upto £100 by the beginning of the Copa Amercia in July.


Once again my strength is evidently with the football here. The Dutch Europa league play-off was rather remarkable with scores of 5-1 in both legs meaning extra-time and penalties. Managed to benefit in both leagues by backing goals, which you'd perfectly understand why if you watched the game.

Always seems to be so many things going on at once. Watched the Monte Carlo Grand Prix this weekend also, by far and away my favourite F1 race of the year. Formula One has really stepped it up this year and the new tyres plus DRS have made for much more exciting races. Unfortunately the safety car and then the red flag spoilt what could have been a classic three car finish with wearing tyres.

I think that's more than enough excitement for one weekend, time for a lie down.

Premier League Season Review

Another exciting Premier League season has gone and past meaning the time has come to review my performance.

Up until the middle of October, bet no. 35 I was operating a level stakes staking plan of £25 per selection. By the end of this period I was down by a signifciant amount totalling £236.42 since that point I refocused and adopted a varied staking plan based on the premise that bigger value selections should have a higher stake, with stake levels varying from £10 upto £25 in £5 intervals. Come the end of the season my loss totalled £293.33 which actually means from November through to May I was only operating at a small loss of £56.91 in comparison to the first half of the year which at least shows I have improved even if I couldn't profit from it.

Below is a graph of my cumulative profit for my Premier League bets this season:


As you can see after the very poor start I did start to pick up a little bit with my change in staking plan and approach to my selections. The period from bet 55 to about bet 110 looks a very smooth upward trend and the sort of thing I would be looking for. The later quarter of the year was a bit up and down as the graph shows but I did at least end the season quite strongly.

Here's some stats for my year's performance including breakdown week-by-week:


Overall it could be easy to pack it in and say it's not working but I'm determined to try and make my Premier League betting work. Although in my opinion I think the Premier League is probably one of the hardest football leagues to profit from because news on teams/players is so widely avaiable that you rarely see odds dramatically priced up "wrong" although there's been plenty of times this season where I've been baffled slightly by how teams have been priced up.

To finish here's three little lessons or things I've picked up on throughout the year which hopefully should help improve my betting for next season, although things are always constanstly changing.

1.) Take advantage of short-term over-reaction bias in the market - Classic case of a team that's on a great run and may be performing beyond expectations or who have just won impressively in their last game. Both Bolton & Blackpool had impressive starts to the season but by the end of it the season they ended up whereabouts they where predicted to. Opposing Blackpool & Bolton in the second half of the season would have been very fruitful indeed. Likewise I opposed Liverpool at home to Tottenham after they thrashed Fulham at Craven Cottage. They where massively backed and therefore I believe there was great value to be had backing the opposition regardless of how brilliant they may have been in their last game. Always remember to take the long-term view into account and the underlying quality of each team not just a team's short-term form.

2.) Be wary of certain teams when odds-on - I'm not one for taking odds-on bets but if do I would always be wary of backing any team that you don't consider to be amongst the best six or seven in the league. Backing mid-table sides like the likes of Stoke, Sunderland, Newcastle & Bolton at odds-on never does appeal to me, there was a lot of closely matched teams this season and I don't think any of these deserved to be priced-up odds-on at any point this season.

3.) Don't be afraid to oppose the big boys - Some people may get a bit tentative when opposing the likes of Chelsea, Man United & Arsenal but it would have been rewarded handsomely if done correctly this season. Man United away form was average considering they ended up Champions likewise Arsenal failed to win many a game at home this season when priced well and truely odds-on. Chelsea also had a mid-season dip which could have been taken advantage of. When certain situations arise its always worth opposing the big boys, these situations usually include after or before a big European match or maybe when they've got key players missing.

Well that's it for the season, already can't wait for the new season in August. Got the Champions League final to come on Saturday also got the Copa America in July which I shall be trying to trade on (probably unsuccessfully).

Weekly Summary No. 20

Looks like I've slipped into Monday once again for my weekly update but yesterday saw the climax of the Premier League season and I needed a bit of rest after all of that drama. The "Survival Sunday" lived upto its billing and there was plenty of twist & turns, ups & downs (notice I didn't mention a certain amusement ride here). It was really exiciting but you've got to feel for the fans, players & managers in charge it can go from joy one minute to despiar the next. People saw it can sometimes be punishment watching your own team in a relegation dog ifht yet people pay for the pleasure. I don't agree with the punishment it may not be nice to see your team relegated but even thoose involved all enjoy the thrill and excitement that a last day of a season so often gives. I shall post some concluding thoughts on the Premier League season later in the week which shall include an analysis of my betting record on the league also.

Back to the betting world and my week. Well last week was a poor week and in line with my recent pattern that surely must mean I was due a profit this week. As it happens that's exactly what happened I recorded a healthy profit of £506.51 for the week which more than covers the loss from last week. Still means I'm at a cumulative loss for the year of just under £250 but at least it appears I'm moving in the right direction once again. May seems to have been kind to me so far and with just over a week left hopefully I can end it on a high.

Last week also saw the end of my exams (hooray!), didn't go entirely smoothily but I've done well enough to secure a reasonable final grade for my degree I think. Shall have to wait for the results to be sure. As a result I have a lot more spare time at present so I can begin to analysis my betting a bit more and maybe find a few more systems to add to my horser racing systems armoury.

To conclude here's a picture from a BBC blog entry called Last-day Mayhem at Molineaux which I think perfectly sums up the joy of surviving relegation can bring. As both the Blackburn & Wolves celebrate their teams survival in unison.

Losing week

After last week's high of a big profit it was probably half expected that I would suffer a losing week this week. It's a reasonable sized loss totalling £340.96 but considering I have a few systems that stake £100 a selection it really isn't that big of a loss in relative terms. Pushes my cumulative loss back out to around £750 for the year, but that's still significantly better than at the start of the month. This week coming sees my final examinations and then maybe I can turn more attention to my gambling and my blog. Although once my exams are over I begin the search for a proper job, which might prove both scary and difficult. I've come to expect the fact that my current betting prospects doesn't lend itself to steady income. The end of year graph for my weekly profit deviations is going to make interesting viewing, maybe I could sell it as a blueprint for a new rollercoaster at the Pleasure Beach or something.

I hate roller coasters and amusements rides, they don't usually agree with my stomach. A bit of a cliche, well a massive one to be fair. But my betting adventures or indeed very much like a rollercoaster my end of year graphical plot will prove that I'm sure. Don't worry I shall try not to mention them again for the fear of bring Ronan Keating into the argument.

Hold on tight!

Short but sweet

Only got time for a short update tonight, should really be revising now (or cramming as I call it) so I'll get on with it. I'm glad to say it's good news, very good news in fact. After a hefty loss of last week totalling near £700 I could have been forgiven for feeling down-heartened once again. But in line with my performance this year a massive loss is followed by a massive profit. This week I recorded my biggest weekly profit of the year (by quite a margin too) netting a not to shabby total of £804.85 for the week. Almost all my attention is on my horse racing systems and selections now, they performed miracles this week to be fair with plenty of juicy priced winners. Not had much time for trading on Betfair this week with me being in the middle of my exams and all.

So overall absolutely chuffed with this week's performance, my cumulative loss for the year is now below the £400 mark, which is the lowest it's been since the beginning of February. Three weeks left in May to try and reduce the deficit further. Although I shall resist from making any sort of predictions because I just end up looking stupid.

End of April Update

Last week I reported a very profitable week, this week I'm afraid I've got a weekly loss of £685.76 to contend with. Mainly due to the fact that a few of my higher staking systems had losing selections, this can sway the results somewhat.

The monthly result in the meantime came to a disappointing loss of £294.23 for the month of April, although that includes my realisation of some long-term bets that ended up a bit wide of the mark. Third losing month on the bounce is not what I wanted, April was a bit of a mixed bag with one really good week (last week) and one really bad week (this week). Really thought I'd end this month in profit but it wasn't to be. My overall cumulative loss for the year is now close to £1,300, I mentioned dropping a few non-working systems and that I have done. Believe it or not all but one of the systems I currently operate are actually showing a profit. My football bets don't seem to be getting anywhere to be honest, I much prefer to trade on football for some reason.

One bright note this month has actually been the aforementioned football trading, I was quite surprised to see my Betfair P/L for football, I did have one big winner (which was directly before the Rory incident) but still the figure is quite impressive really especially since my bank was very tiny and below the £20 mark for the majority of the month. I'd be quite happy to turn over a £150 profit a month at present to be honest, although that's not likely right now with such a small bank. But I'll continue to build up and learn slowly along the away and hopefully not make any stupid mistakes like the one which spoils this P/L.

Betfair April P/L

Onwards and upwards for the remainder of the year I guess. Got lots of (important) exams going up over the next few weeks, so I don't think I'll have any time for any midweek topical posts I'm afraid. I shall however continue with the weekly updates, I'll try and get back into the habit of Sunday nights rather than Monday mornings also. Should really be revising right now to be honest, I blame the enthralling snooker for my lack of revision thus far.