Recent Articles
Some winter cheer
One look at the racing card will echo what you will have seen for the last month or so, abandoned racing. It’s the worst period I have known in my ten years on Betfair, pretty bleak. Boxing day usually brings a whole slew of opportunity and some top quality action at Kempton. Today, out of the 11 meetings due to take place today, only one hasn’t been abandoned as I write this, and there is a real prospect of that …
Overreaction to Aussie supremacy?
Having taken a look at the stats in preparation for the fourth Ashes Test down under, one of the things that has really stood out is that there has not been a draw at the MCG since 1997. In that period there have been 10 Australian victories and England were beaten by an innings and 99 runs the last time the sides clashed.
There’s no denying that the Baggy Greens have an excellent record at the MCG, but traders should …
Merry Christmas and all that!
Just a sort note to wish you a Merry Christmas / happy holidays and all that stuff. 2010 has been a good year and we are looking forward to more of the same next year. With the weather not exactly perfect, I’m off to spend an extended break with the family. I hope you enjoy the festive period.
Going grey
With the weather hitting the horse racing, I’ve been playing around in Greyhound markets a lot more. Greyhound markets are a different beast from horse racing for sure, but they are viable as a market. I don’t think they are viable on the scale of other markets but they certainly can produce the goods. I can’t afford to spend too much time on these markets but I think they should be of interest to many others.
In this P&L you …
New Betfair charge?
Seems like a lot of people received an email from Betfair yesterday evening saying they will charged £4 a month if they have an inactive account. Even I got one!
My inactive account was an account I used to test Euro configurations of Bet Angel and now, despite my activity elsewhere, it looks like they want to charge me unless I actively use it. I’ll be on the phone this morning to withdraw funds and close it down. I suspect …
I predict a draw (Part 3)
Can you guess the outcome of this match? In total £4.1m out of a total of £4.36m traded was on the draw. Remarkable!
I predict a draw (Part 2)
Second part of what will probably be a three part post.
The draw is now trading at a remarkable 1.42 and £2.85m of £3m on the match is on the draw! To put that into perspective only 10% of the money on the Man City vs Everton match is on the draw, a more rational number.
Question now is what sort of a draw will it be. 1-1 is usually the favoured result and that is being backed in as …
I predict a draw (Part 1)
The draw is a “underactive” area of the match odds market. Out of the three outcomes availble, the draw tends to get proportionatly little attention and volume out of the three.
So, a bit of a surprise to see the draw accounting for 96% of the volume in the match. Not only that but even more surprising to see the odds backed in from 3.00 to 1.30, before the off. The italian football market is a curious one isn’t it?…
McCoy is sports personality of the year
Well done AP, well deserved. Looks like racing’s campaign to raise awareness, and votes, has paid off. I’ve got a lot of respect for jump jockey’s and especially for AP. So it’s great to see it the sport getting recognised.
SPOTY
Or Sports Personality Of The Year in its long form.
Let me declare my interest. I would love Tony McCoy to win this award. Not only is it fully deserved, but it would also give a boost to racing. Let me temper that with the fact that the short priced favourite just never seems to win this award any more. Also, in the general public, there is little recognition of who Tony McCoy is.
Before I got into horse racing …
Something from nothing
Hey, it’s been tough lately but that’s no reason to give up completely. Yes, you can be relaxed if you have worked hard during the peak season, but there is still opportunity out there; even if somewhat reduced.
Despite running around to do the last few elements of organisation ahead of Christmas I sat down behind my screen for the odd moment yesterday to keep my hand in on the racing. Not a great total but I know a lot …
Arsenal’s price shoots out
The draw for the first knockout stage of the Champions League has been made and of the four English clubs in the competition Arsenal have been dealt the toughest two-legged clash by drawing Barcelona.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, the price for the Gunners to win the tournament immediately doubled subsequent to the draw from around 15 to 30. Traders watching the proceedings may have been able to see that Arsenal were to draw Barca, anticipate the shift and beat the hordes to …
Europa league ratings
Twelve matches and I reckon there should be around 33/34 goals. It’s tougher at this stage of the tournament as incentives to score can vary and so can the strength of teams put out. So I tend to be less confident at this stage of the tournament. The knockout phase usually brings out better motivation in players.
The three matches I’d be most likely to lean on over 2.5 goals are Stuttgart, Lille and Anderlecht.
The three matches I’d be …
Betfair results fail to impress
Betfair announced their maiden results yesterday. You can view the full regulatory release here: –
https://www.investegate.co.uk/Article.aspx?id=201012140700098801X
Or a more concise BBC report here: –
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11989347
The upshot was that the city didn’t like them and sent the shares down 16% to below £10 for the first time. Quite some way from the £15.50 reached on the first day of trading. The results always contain some interesting reading material and now they are public, we will get to see a formal …
Much better
Not only am I feeling better but I must say, what a relief it was today to experiance three race meetings on in the afternoon and some decent field sizes as well! After such a barren spell recently, it was really nice to get really stuck into some markets again.
Despite keeping my hand in the game over the recent barren spell I haven’t been doing as much as normal and it’s suprising how rusty you can get. I’d be …
And the winner is?
‘Reality’ TV is reaching it’s year end climax and I’m looking forward to a boost to my December totals.
Despite their nature, there are sometimes some very intuitive trades to be made on reality shows. Not always, but quite often, opportunities jump out of these contests. So while I don’t tend to watch this sort of stuff, some logic will point you in the direction of a clear opportunity.
On the X-Factor I have had up to £4.5k green on …
Arsenal the business
If you look at the top of the premiership there is a lot of ‘buying points’ going on. Chelsea and Man City have spent a fortune buying up talent to keep hold of a top four place. Man Utd have also spent a lot, but not as prolifically as the former teams. One likely reason for this is that Man Utd are run as a business, albeit a heavily indebted one. So they can’t afford to run the business in …
Cheltenham didn’t bust
Phew, things worked out OK today. Nothing spectacular for sure, but £560 from 14 markets is a useful return to the fold. Nearly all that came from Cheltenham, so the prospect of a decent day looks on the cards with the twilight and evening racing to come.
Cheltenham or bust!
With most of the racing lost to the weather once again it looks like the week will rest on Cheltenham for most racing traders. It’s a high risk strategy as there is no gaurentee that Cheltenham will provide favourable markets, especially with little infront or behind of it. Already Channel Four have asked for the times to be put back so they can cover the meeting, that’s going to impact things as well. Lets hope that when the races get …
No end in sight
Just been browsing the Met Office web site for news on when the cold weather will end. Unfortunately, despite a respite at the weekend, it looks like it is still here for a while. The main issue being a high pressure in the Atlantic blocking progress of a westerly airstream.
I was on fire this week last year and could do no wrong, difficult to be on fire this year. On a daily basis there is very little to be …
Online betting tax imposed
Stark headline for a lot in this sector, but in the latest austerity budget in Ireland there were proposals to level out the playing field by introducing a new tax on phone and Internet gambling. As always, details are a bit sketchy at the moment but shops have been taxed for sometime but other channels not, so this is addressing that discrepancy.
Quite how it will work and be enforced is difficult to see at the moment, but it will …
Next NUFC manager
Newcastle United FC’s sacking of Chris Hughton – apart from being one of the most stupid backroom decisions in the ludicrous world of Premier League football – opened us up to a few smart trades over the last couple of days.
The favourite usually chops and changes based on nothing more than speculation and is directly affected by what the potential new managers say in the media. Martin O’Neill was installed as the immediate favourite, then Alan Pardew quickly moved …
Lessons from Liverpool
Tonight we are in the final group stages of the champions league. These matches can throw up some odd results as some have strong incentives to win and others much less so.
Last night the market was pretty stable in the Liverpool vs Aston Villa match. Then the teamsheet came out and there was no Gerrard or Torres on it! You can see the effect this had on the price. It is always worth remembering that while football matches are …
The week that wasn’t
I picked a good week to be ill last week. Never will a chest infection and fever be so well timed!
It’s never fun to be ill but with so much racing cancelled last week and some football, there was little going on in the markets. It can be really tough making money sometimes but a complete absense of opportunity obviously isn’t going to help either. But I actually quite enjoy the lack of pressure to perform and the chance …
Don’t pay till May
It was only when my favourite football club got relegated that I started playing around in the relegation and promotion markets. Since then it has become a regular stamping ground for me during the season, especially at the start or end. People seem to have this wonderful propensity to put too much emphasis on recent results or events. Either that or they carry hopes that are just clearly out of whack with reality.
So far this year I have made …
Trade the Ashes to Adelaide…
Australia enter the second Ashes Test under intense pressure after being humiliated by England, who managed to turn around the first Test in Brisbane last week.
The Adelaide Oval, venue for the Second Test, was once famous for throwing up frequent draws, although there have only been three here since 1991.
If anyone’s considering laying the draw on Betfair or Betdaq (currently trading at 2.06), I wouldn’t disagree with them, despite Australia seemingly lacking a convincingly reliable wicket taker and …
Europa league ratings
Just put these on the forum.
It looks like the football will be one of few sports going ahead today, so I may as well make the most of it. We have been very close consistently on the goals tally but this evening poses a few problems given the increased importance of some of the matches. Early goals will most likely produce more goals than forecast due to the incentive to score.
2012 all over again?
Been keeping an eye on the winner of the 2018 world cup bid market. England are shortening up quite quickly and are now favourites to win the tournament. I hope they do, or else I will be a very old man by the time the World Cup tournament eventually comes, if it does at all, to England.
It’s very reminiscent of the London 2012 Olympic bid. Paris were in the lead for ages are looked nailed on to win the …
Snovember
That was an interesting month.
The end of the month was a complete damp squib, which was a shame, but the start was well above expectations. The result was that I managed another month up on the prior year and in fact I somehow managed to beat June, which is a bit weird. I was active on 871 races during the month, so it was still quite a busy month. Biggest individual race topped £1.1k and my worst loss was …
Carling cup
I don’t do too much on the Carling Cup but if I was on tonight, then opposing big teams fielding weakened sides is probably not a terrible idea. I find it difficult to price these matches, but a bit of speculative position taking is never going to be a disaster given the incentives in these types of matches.
The outsider will tend not to drift much if at all in the first half so a back at large odds will …
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