Archive for Updates
Open positions update – February 2012
Posted by: | CommentsAfternoon all,
As I promised at the weekend, I am going to get the site back up to full speed over the coming weeks with some new betting theory pieces and a renewed focus on bringing the value to the masses. After all, we are all enduring what seems to be a never ending recession.
However, before I dive into anything new, I thought it best to have a bit of a spring clean. I’m not a fan of the hoover, so instead I thought I would review all of the current open positions and see how we are shaped.
Always use a betting “bank”
A quick bit of advice before I start. If you are actively following tips from BOTW, other betting resources or betting based on your own research, you really should establish a betting bank. It is very bad practice to bet straight from your bank account and can lead to all sorts of bad habits.
It is important to note that you don’t have to tie up your capital in betting accounts – In fact this is in itself bad practice and opens you up to a number of risks including, fraud, dopeyitis (see below) and corporate insolvency. Trust me on this one… I used to be a loyal Full Tilt Poker player… My lax attitude and loyalty cost me a decent amount of cash last year.
The best way to create a betting bank is to carve out some cash from your savings and put it in a separate bank account to your other savings and current account. In the modern world of online banking there really is no excuse not to do this.
Having a structured betting bank has a number of other advantages in addition to helping mitigate the risks mention above. It allows you to start following a relative (rather than absolute) staking strategy, increases discipline and I find even sharpens your motivation to do thorough research. And all of those ultimately protect you against loose bets, reduce losing and increasing net profits. And after all that is the aim of game.
Record keeping
If you are treating your betting bank as an investment portfolio, using a relative staking system (i.e. taking positions of 1-10% of available capital) and taking medium and long term positions it becomes crucial to keep proper records. Not only will this allow you to analyse your performance and manage your risk, but it will also help you avoid the biggest danger of the online betting world – dopeyitis.
Remember that great 20/1 each-way bet you placed on Birmingham to win the Championship back in October?
You picked up nicely on that goal difference regression? Nice work. Spotted the poorly priced fixture list imbalance? Oh yeah. You had the balls to put your money where your mouth is? You the daddy.
Roll forward to May… Birmingham finish comfortably in 2nd behind champions West Ham. Time to pick up your winnings.
Now… hmmm. Where did I place that bet again? Stan James? Paddy Power?
I know I did it through Oddschecker to ensure I got the best possible price. But that is all I can remember.
This is a serious dose of dopeyitis, and although ultimately it is unlikely to cost you your winnings, that feeling of panic in the pit of your stomach as you frantically log in and out of 27 betting accounts is there for a reason. To teach you a lesson for not keeping a record of your bets, not analysis your performance and ultimately not controlling your risk.
Just do it.
The silly tales above ring a few bells do they? If I liked to gamble, I would bet they do with at least 50% of the people reading this. I know some of my most betting-savvy friends still bet from their current account and don’t keep records…
If you are going to try and make money from this tough game long term, it’s time to get organised. Today. Now.
Home and…
Three of our thirteen open positions are looking dandy doodle do.
We have a 1.5% e/w position on RVP to be the Premier League Top Goalscorer at a whopping 20/1. Unless you have spent the last six month son the moon, you’ve probably noticed that the Dutchman is having an OK year. Well, by OK year I actually mean KILLING IT.
Here’s how things stand in the scoring charts after 25 games:
EPL Top Goalscorers (Game 25)
| Player | Club | Goals |
|
Van Persie |
Arsenal |
22 |
|
Rooney |
Man Utd |
17 |
|
Ba |
Newcastle |
16 |
|
Aguero |
Man City |
15 |
|
Yakubu |
Blackburn |
13 |
|
Dzeko |
Man City |
12 |
|
Adebayor |
Tottenham |
10 |
|
Dempsey |
Fulham |
10 |
|
Fletcher |
Wolves |
10 |
|
Graham |
Swansea |
10 |
|
Bale |
Tottenham |
9 |
|
Balotelli |
Man City |
9 |
|
Bent |
Aston Villa |
9 |
|
Holt |
Norwich |
9 |
|
Lampard |
Chelsea |
9 |
|
Sturridge |
Chelsea |
9 |
Even if he “does a Van Persie” and pulls a hamstring next week, I think the Dutchman has secured the place bet at a minimum.
You will also notice the name of Wayne Rooney, highlighted and sitting in 2nd place after this brace against Luis Suarez last week.
We also have the united penalty taker for 2% each-way – also at a great 9/1. I think I can guess how the bookies are feeling about making Javier Hernandez the favourite in the ante-post markets.
I believe the win for one or the other is inevitable in the event they both stay fit. And with a decent headwind we should take home a win and a place.
Even closer to dry land is our position on Rooney to be the top English goalscorer (2%, 3/1). As you can see the international flavour of the Premier League has never been more evident than in the current scoring charts. Rooney’s nearest challengers are the impressive Danny Graham and the ever consistent Darren Bent.
However, I think they will both struggle to even reach Rooney’s current tally of 17, so I think we can chalk up another winner there.
Looking good
I think there are another four of the open positions that are looking very strong.
I took advantage of some significant “London/Money/Other” bias in the Top Promoted Team market early season by taking Norwich City at 2/1 versus Swansea and QPR. Although the Swans style of play probably draws more media attention, Norwich have been the biggest success story by far and I think Paul Lambert is well on the way to a Manger of the Year award. And we are well on our way to a nice tasty winner.
However, things aren’t looking quite so good for Wigan Athletic. Which is a shame for both Latics and wider football fans alike – but great news for BOTW followers. That is likely to be another winner in the bag.
Down in the Championship, West Ham are also looking good at 3.25 to take the title. But given they play one of the main rivals Southampton at Upton Park this evening, the less said about that for now, the better.
Struggling for air
Our speculative 20/1 e/w shout on young Daniel Sturridge in the aforementioned Top English Goalscorer market is still alive. He is currently joint third on 9 goals, which would be good enough for a place. However, his goals have dried up of late and with Chelsea struggling I am expecting this one to come up just short.
However, Huddersfield’s title challenge in League 1 is fading fast and, without a capitulation from the boys down at The Valley, will likely result in us taking a 6% hit.
Two other likely losers are actually due to one downside exposure – my complete misinterpretation of Newcastle United coming into this season. I don’t feel too bad about it. I doubt even the most die-hard Geordies didn’t even expect a top 8 finish from their boys.
As a result, Everton will not be taking the “Best of the Rest” title for once this year and despite the best efforts of MO’N, it seems a big stretch to think that Sunderland could make up nine points over the remainder of the season to take the group bet against Newcastle, Stoke and Bolton.
Dead and Buried
Two off the open positions are already dead and buried, although one of those was only a cover bet – chances are Didier Drobga isn’t going to score twenty goals in Chelsea’s next thirteen games! Also floating on the surface covered in algae are my speculative ”one to trade later” on Chelsea making a title charge. The less said about that the better.
Actually, if I am honest, personally I quite like talking about the Blues’ rapid demise under AVB! Hurrah!
Summary
All in all, I am delighted with my ante post betting on this season. You are always going to get the odd bust, it’s all part of the game. However on the whole, we are set to make a nice little profit.
Here’s to a successful end to the season for these positions whilst we also boost the coffers with a few winners down the stretch.
Cheers.
Open positions update (4/8)
Posted by: | CommentsAfternoon all.
Long time no speak. I hope we are all well and waiting nervously for the return of the football season? Only 6 days to go now until the big kick off. I cant wait to have Jeff and the gang back on our screens and the money rolling in once again.
And in case you were wondering (and I wouldn’t blame you if you were given the low level of summer activity) BOTW will be back in earnest from this point onwards, bringing you all the best value from both the weekly coupons and the lucrative long term / specials markets.
However, before we get into all that shenanigans, I thought I would post a quick update on the outstanding baseball positions.
The rough and the smoothly
Posted by: | CommentsMorning all.
Sunday night saw BOTW chalked up a somewhat unorthodox (but rather satisfying) 2pt win, as the Chicago White Sox broke out late on to beat the Arizona Diamondbacks 8-2.
Sadly, Sunday was probably still a 3pt losing night for BOTW. Confused?
Open Positions – Update 6/11
Posted by: | CommentsEvening all,
Back again. I’m like a London bus.
Activity here on the site should be back somewhere close to normal (off season) levels again now.
Again, apologies for the lull in activity the last couple of months. I’ve been a busy boy.
I thought I should put together a quick summary of BOTW’s current open positions – of which there are five.
Obviously, given that it is the middle of June I don’t have any live football exposure at the moment. Everything I have at the moment is baseball related.
Now, I know baseball isn’t most peoples cup of tea. So, feel free to turn off now and head back to search for “artist” shots of Elsa Pataky on Google if you wish.
But if you only ever listen to me about one more thing in your life, it should be to give baseball a try. It is a fantastic sport to follow for so many reasons. To name just a few:
1) There are 162 games a season. That’s a lot of sport to watch and beer to drink;
2) There is an infinite amount of data to analyse if you so wish; and
3) There are a lot of markets you can bet on, and the UK bookies are a little sloppy at times on a number of the markets.
Anyway, I could wax lyrical about the game of baseball all night long. But before I bore you to tears, let’s have a look at those open positions:
End of season recap – Long term positions
Posted by: | CommentsEvening all.
Long, long time no speak.
How are we all?
Sorry for being so quite over the last month or two. I have been manically busy. I might even have been maniacally busy thinking about it.
However, two heavy drinking holidays, topped off with a quick dose of stag do later, I am back and looking forward to the summer.
I was going to pop up my first baseball piece for the summer, along with a little update on the open baseball positions, but then I realised I hadn’t put up a debrief of the season long football positions which matured over the course of April and May.
So I thought I best tie up those loose ends first…
Healthy returns
Overall, my long term football selections were a great success. Throughout the course of the year I placed 23 bets, consisting 19 selections and 4 hedges.
Of the 19 selections I had 10 winners and 9 losers, generating a 19.5% increase in the BOTW coffers.
Nice headline numbers I guess. I did notice a couple of other things when carrying out my internal audit. My pre season antepost selections were absolutely red hot…
Red hot antepost selections
Of my 8 early season positions, 6 ended up being winners which is better than I would ever have dared hope for!
I took a reasonably chunky loss on the Birmingham debacle, which has been well documented. There are exceptions to every rule.
My only other loss was Andy Carroll not being Newcastle’s top goalscorer… If ever there was an example of why, irrespective of price and edge you need to protect against the unknown then this is it!
Even when you have AA in the hole, you are going to get beat 20% of the time. This was very much one of those 20% rather than a poor selection.
Of the winners, Bolton brought home a healthy return over 41 points – assisted by John Elmander’s early season goals – which was also a nice winner for BOTW at 7/2.
Johan’s now off to Turkey – while we are feasting on it!
Everton just about got their act together in time to take their usual “Best of the Rest” position, and Blackburn “coasted” home in their tete-a-tete with West Ham.
The long term winners were closed out with Alex McLeish staying in charge at Birmingham until week 38 and down in League One the combined Southampton/Brighton split stakes position really was never in doubt.
A cracking set of results all around really.
Staggering, kebab in hand
Sadly, I didn’t manage to finish off the year as I began – with my late season positions faltering to a 7.5% loss.
Solid wins on my FA Cup and Top Goalscorer medleys were more than offset by my misreading of the relegation battle.
West Ham’s diabolical attempts at staying up cost me on numerous fronts – as I had backed them to stay up and by getting relegated after game 37 I also lost my ever manager to see out the season bet.
Other wins on QPR and Aston Villa were again offset by losses on Roy Hodgson Albion’s remarkable turnaround and Brentford’s erratic form down in League One.
A 7.5% loss is not likely to see me nationalised, but given the track record here at BOTW it is not what I have come to expect. Hey, at the end of the day it happens to even the very best every now and then – just ask Antony Bolton!
If West Ham had secured a point at Wigan in game 37, we would have been looking at a huge swing and a 10% increase in funds which I would have been delighted with.
It’s a game of small margins. As many an Arsenal fan will no doubt agree.
Let’s play ball!
So there we have it. That is the end of what was a very successful 2010/11 football season here at BOTW.
Here’s to a successful 2011/12 campaign.
And what fantastic timing I have – with the fixture list for next season out today!
Some spicy early fixtures in there, with Man United in particular having an interesting fixture list. Tottenham, Arsenal and Chelsea in the first five games. The most interesting part of their fixture list however is how easy the run in is. From the end of March onwards they might just be able to coast home… The rest of the league need to raise their games.
However, thankfully for the neutral I expect a lot of the Premier League teams to come on leaps and bounds this season. I expect Chelsea to be significantly more effective and City should develop further. And if the numerous of cash being spent at the Emirates are true, the Gooners should also improve.
However, I shall save all my thoughts on that for about six weeks time.
In the meantime, I plan to focus on the baseball season for a few weeks. So if you have any interest in learning a little bit more about boys’ rounders then keep checking in. I’m going to go through some of the rules, some of the nuances of the sport and where you can look for value in the betting markets.
Unfortunately for those with a lack of faith, you’ve already missed a fair chunk…
Cheers