Regular followers of the blog will be familiar with the approach I take
to selecting bets and trades, that being one based on stats and form rather
than subjective opinions. I have
invested many hours into developing my own models, with various successes. In the main, I have compared teams using form
and momentum, home and away averages with some attempts to grade teams. These are just a few of the variables that
you may like to consider when predicting the outcome of a game, there are many
more and some that just cannot be measured.
With this in mind, whether you create your own prediction tools
or rely on those of others, consider that every model is wrong! What you do hope to develop / find is a model
that is useful and assists in making informed picks for long term
profitability.
An important factor which I
would like to consider more in my decision making is the status / grade of a
team. Most teams will set up and adapt
their tactics / line-ups depending on the strengths of the opposition. I would therefore expect that basing betting
decisions purely on form and without the consideration of respective team strength
restricts long term profitability.
For I while, I have followed the guys at Premier Betting who recognise
the importance of considering the respective team grades in determining their
selections. I’ve heard good reviews of
their Betform Pro software so over the next month I will be trialling this tool
to support my own models and (hopefully) make better betting and trading
decisions. I’ll be posting my trades
over the month and I’ll keep a running profit / loss based on small, level
stakes for the trial period.
Regarding the trades, these will be a combination of my own concoctions
and those I have learnt while a member of The Sports Trading Academy(TSTA). I keep meaning to write a review
of TSTA but I think the fact I can be found in the trading room most weekends
is testament to the service. I only
expanded into trading in the summer and, after a period of stubbornness & taking
a couple of big hits trying to figure it out myself, I decided to take some
professional advice; an easy decision at £10 for the first month. With hindsight, I should have taken advice sooner, after all, I didn’t risk writing off my car by trying to
teach myself how to drive, so why risk wiping out my betting bank trying to
teach myself how to trade.
Liverpool v Wigan
85% of stake placed on Under 2.5 goals and remaining 15% stake dutched evenly across 2:1,3:0,1:2,0:3 scorelines. Can scalp 0:0 prematch and hedge for reduced liability / scratch on CS market although I will look to hedge any 0:0 green on 25 mins.
Newcastle v Swansea
123 trade with stake distributed 15%,35% & 50% respectively.
Reading v Everton
Variation of the Lazy Lamb trade although a back of the draw instead of of the usual lay.
70% of stake dutched across the correct scores and the remaining 30% placed on the draw.
WBA v Chelsea
70% of stake dutched across 1:0,0:2,1:2,0:3,1:3 and 30% placed on the draw.
I hope to be back later this afternoon with some additional trades for the evening.
All the best
Ronnie.
