Following up the successful 2016 Summer League Campaign, here is our complete report on the 2016-17 Winter League Campaign, based on 18 different top flight leagues.
2016-17 Winter League Profit Curve
We will try to avoid repeating what was said in the summer league article so that it is all new information for you here.
For the sake of completeness, you should still read and digest both reports for a full idea of our strategies and thought processes.
And you will find the current stock of available HDAFU tables via this link.
2016-17 Campaign Report
Measures of Risk
Before beginning to plan any portfolio or placing bets, you will need to review your analyses and rank the systems you have found according to risk exposure based on the values of the upper inflection point odds.
This will allow you to compile a portfolio with a healthy balance of risk, which is essential to the success of any investment plan.
Here is our rough guide:
- Low Risk (Probability 45.00% or more; upper inflection point maximum odds of 2.22)
- Low-medium Risk (Probability 44.99%-35.00%; upper inflection point maximum odds of 2.85)
- Medium Risk (Probability 34.99%-22.50%; upper inflection point maximum odds of 4.44)
- Medium-high Risk (Probability 22.99%-16.00%; upper inflection point maximum odds of 6.25)
- High Risk (Probability 15.99% or less; upper inflection point odds above 6.25)
Discretion is used if a system does not fit these parameters or crosses two or more classifications – In these cases, the harmonic mean odds of all the games in the set is used as the benchmark to guage risk. The Excel formula for a range of odds in cells A1 to A100 would be: =HARMEAN(A1:A100)
Measures of Success
You will also need a definitive framework to be able to judge the final results.
For us, the final results of any league fall into four distinct categories:
- Systems that achieve a six-season-high (i.e. profits larger than any of the previous five seasons). (Over-Achievers).
- Those that make a profit over and above the size of the initial stake (£100 in our case), but fall short of six-season-high results. (Achievers).
- Strategies that break-even or, record a tiny profit or loss up to the size of the initial stake (£100 in our case). (Zero-Sum).
- Leagues that make a loss over and above the size of the initial stake. (Losers).
You can already see that two of these outcomes are favourable, one is neutral, and only one is detrimental.
2016-17 League-by-League Review
Let’s have a brief look at each league to see how our 22 systems fared. (Alphabetically according to the tab codes in the workbook):
1. AUS1 – Austria Bundesliga – Whole Season System
Only eight of 28 bets won, but this was enough to see a profit of £882.00. Hit rate and yield were both below the calculated averages and the resultant profit figure was lower than any of the five previous seasons’ figures.
Result: Achiever
2. BEL1 – Belgium Jupiler League – Whole Season System
Up to, but not including Europa League and Championship Group splits
Both the estimated hit rate (33 out of 97 bets won) and yield figures were surpassed by wide margins, leading to a six-season-high profit figure of £3,108.00.
Result: Over-Achiever
3. CZE1A – Czech Republic 1. Liga – First Half Season System
Up to the 04/12/2016 winter break
Nine out of 22 bets won, and whilst the hit rate and yield both outstripped expectations, the profit figure settled at £1,247.00, the fourth largest in the last six seasons.
Result: Achiever
4. CZE1B – Czech Republic 1. Liga – Second Half Season System
From 18/02/2017 start of the second half of the season
This one suffered its worst result in the last six seasons, but the resultant loss was minimal at -£310.00.
Result: Loser
5. DEN1A – Denmark Superligaen – First Half Season System
This was the only system employed in this league purely because the format of the second half of the 2016-17 season was to change from previous seasons.
Although hit rate and yield were both below estimates, the system still recorded its third highest total for six seasons at £1,238.00.
There were twice as many bets than expected (largely due to the fact that around 40% more games than usual were played in the first half of the season to accommodate the new second half season format).
Result: Achiever
6. ENG1 – England Premier League – Whole Season System
This system suffered the longest losing streak we have ever encountered, almost 14% worse than expected, for a very painful 36 straight losses. (A six-season-low).
However, the situation was mostly recovered by three big winners all carrying odds of over 12.00, for a final loss of just -£32.00.
The last six bets of the season lost, but had only one of these been a winner, this system would have returned a profit. Small margins.
Result: Zero-Sum
7. FRA1 – France Ligue 1 – Whole Season System
Hit rate and yield were both below par, but the league turned in a steady performance for a profit of £1,634.00, ranked fifth largest in the last six seasons.
Result: Achiever
8. FRA2 – France Ligue 2 – Whole Season System
The same story as France Ligue 1, but with a profit of £2,801.00, for its third largest profit figure in six seasons.
This one was unusual for a much higher number of bets than expected. (215 vs. 119 estimate – Profit was at £2,523.00 after 119 bets).
Result: Achiever
9. GER1A – Germany Bundesliga 1 – First Half Season System
Up to 21/12/2016 winter break
Another below par system, but one that still achieved a profit of £1,098.00. (Fourth largest in six seasons).
Result: Achiever
10. GER1B – Germany Bundesliga 1 – Second Half Season System
From 20/01/2017 start of the second half of the season
The very rare inclusion of a system with two non-profitable seasons (the oldest two) in the previous five.
It featured one more bet than expected, which won, to total one more winner than expected. Hit rate and yield both exceeded estimates for a profit of £1,294.00. (Fourth largest in six seasons).
Result: Achiever
11. GRE1 – Greece Super League – Whole Season System
The hit rate here was almost 8% below estimate and resulted in the worst performance for six seasons, and a loss of -£819.00.
Result: Loser
Hi,
Firstly I just want to say congratulations and thank you on publishing such great work! I’ve just started looking through my chosen leagues and have a few questions:
1. First things first – I don’t have the funds to purchase a significant amount of your workbooks just yet but from the few I have purchased I’ve chosen systems with either 4/5 or 5/5 profitable seasons. Until I can afford more how many systems would you say is the minimum to create a balanced portfolio?
2. In one of my systems (I won’t name which one) I’ve done some analysis and found a system that almost seems too good to be true. It’s a Back the Draw system in the first half of the season, and according to the Inflection Points graph the best system looks to be backing a draw in literally every single game in that league. Now, there is a little statistical noise in the middle but the profit at either end of that breakeven stretch looks to outweigh that small negative. Is backing the same result in every single match actually a viable strategy or should I try to hone it down (reducing the amount of bets but almost certainly reducing profitability?)
Hello Alex,
Yes, we have certainly used systems in the past that have employed all matches in a league during a season, but I would suggest analysing both halves of your profitable inflection points curve separately to find out if one is substantially better than the other.
Look separately at the five seasons’ results for both profitable portions of your curve. You may find one section is supported by an anomalous season, or is perhaps not in profit in a couple of seasons? Maybe both portions combine to give a good overall result, but with more depth to your analysis, you may see that one is actually supporting the other.
If there still isn’t much difference between the two after filtering our the statistical noice in-between, then perhaps it is worth going with all games.
But, we are looking for the synergy of the best individual systems we can find in each league rather than having competing systems in the same league. Taking all games will certainly cost you more time (to place the bets) and will ultimately reduce yield (as the final profit on the portfolio will be spread thinner over more bets). Pay attention to the estimated yield of your entire portfolio when making this decision. How is this figure affected by taking one of the profitable systems and not the other?
Your losing streaks may also be stretched a little in the wrong direction with more bets.
My advice would be to take the best portion of the curve only. It’s like saying in general that we like eating chicken, but instead of trying to eat a whole one and giving yourself indigestion, stick to the bit you enjoy most (the breast in my case, the legs in Soccerwidow’s case!).
Our usual advice applies to the size of portfolio: you’ll need one large enough to project an estimated minimum of 500 bets during the duration of your campaign. (The law of large numbers). But don’t use this as an excuse to extend a system to a whole league; you’ll get better results across the board by playing only the best portion of the curve in each league you run.
I hope this helps your thinking and thanks for the good questions!
Thank you for the detailed answer. I’ll definitely delve into that further tonight and come up with hopefully the best system.
Just one more quick question – Do you use the Backing By Team section to further refine your system? Sticking with my “Backing the Draw” example from above I can see that if I bet on a draw in every game over the last five seasons I’d be massively in profit, but delving into the team section I can see that certain teams aren’t profitable.
For example, let’s call them “Team A”. If we had backed a draw in every match in which Team A were the visiting side we would have lost over £1,000, with only one of the five seasons resulting in a profit. Do you further increase the ROI of your systems by excluding these proven unprofitable teams from the system?
And one more question (sorry)
I remember you mentioning about clearly unprofitable systems representing good lay opportunities which obviously makes sense. My question is how you construct these Lay systems?
For example if you’re laying an outcome between inflection points of 1.45 and 1.68 do you alter your lay stake so that your liability is always constant. So a higher stake would be used on 1.45 odds than 1.68 to keep the liability constant?
Alex,
Firstly, we don’t like ante post lay systems purely because with exchanges, the lay odds have to be above the back odds, and of course exchanges also charge commission.
Both of these elements combine to remove a lot of the value or ‘edge’ and make lay systems rather painful exercises.
You must also realise that laying is the bookmaker model when they offer back bets for sale.
When you understand that overrounds (the bookmakers’ profit margins) are relatively small (perhaps just 2% with the sharpest books such as Pinnacle), you will then realise that the profits to be had from ante post laying also have to be relative to these small percentages.
In our experience, ante post lay betting is only beneficial from an arbitrage perspective where profits are again very small, or to take advantage of bigger odds movements in-play.
We have tried many ante post lay systems over the years and it is soul-destroying when you hit a losing patch. It then takes many more winning bets to recover and get back into a stride. It’s usually a case of three steps forward and then two and-three-quarters back, sometimes more.
Matching the way the backing stakes are placed by having fixed-win/liability lay bets is a guarantee of a roller-coaster ride. It is also a real pain trying to apply ratchets and stop loss mechanisms to lay systems.
However, if this still hasn’t dissuaded you from looking at lay opportunities then just read the HDAFU tables’ results in reverse. Follow the instructions in the Notes Tab to set Odds Toggle and Commission Rate figures, and then look at the largest negative figures (treating them in your mind as positive ones). Reverse in your mind the winning and losing streaks too.
You may be able to find something too good to miss out on, but personally speaking, we stick to backing as it’s a far more consistent profit curve. Lay curves are more jagged with more pronounced statistical noise.
We’ve long battled with ourselves as to whether to show lay betting in the tables (we once did include them), but we have finally decided that if we’re not comfortable with it ourselves, then we won’t actively promote it to our customers.
I hope this explains.
Hello again Alex,
The ‘Backing by Team’ tab is an old favourite of many people and we keep it in the tables for those who want to investigate portfolios of teams, rather than betting solely on odds.
But for the purposes of this article, yes, we do sometimes filter the data tab by teams (home and away) to see if there are any ‘usual suspects’ that constantly let the system down.
This is more likely in leagues that are dominated by just one or two teams, season in, season out.
Just filter out the teams and hide the relevant rows, before re-sorting back into chronological order and amending the formulas (as per the User Guide).
Another good point! You’re on the right track.
Hi Right Winger,
Thanks for that, I’ll take your laying advice on board and stick to back bets for now at least!
Good idea on the filtering out teams on the Data tab, I was just thinking of using the Team tab and excluding those teams out of my bets but your way means I can directly compare the Yield and ROI for systems with and without said teams. Seems I’ve got a lot of research to do tomorrow!
By the way, regarding my earlier post about the system betting on every match – You were right. I filtered and compared the two sides of the statistical noise and found one system that smashes the other out of the water! A yield of almost 50% (compared to 30% for the system before the noise and 25% for backing a draw in all games.) Not to mention the fact that 5/5 seasons are profitable. Overall, the system I have chosen to go for yields an average £3000 profit per season in just 61 average bets, compared to £3900 profit on average over 156 bets if betting on every game!
Hi Right Winger,
I have been reading the comments earlier in these threads about applying ratchet/stop-loss systems to individual systems in the portfolio.
Of course, the same numbers can’t be applied as for the whole portfolio when it comes to trigger points, as the numbers will be effectively split in
Is there any way to determine an individual ratchet/stop-loss system for each system in the portfolio, or could you give me some suggestions?
Maybe a relation with LLS, or average expected bets per round?
I am very keen to hear your thoughts on this.
Hello AM0751,
Of course it is possible to run each system separately within the portfolio, but our leaning now is probably towards ratchet and stop-loss triggers applied to the portfolio as a whole. (Contrary to my thoughts in the comment above to Jo on 27th June, 7.45pm).
The synergy of the whole is what makes things happen, and this is what you should trade on to maximise profits.
It starts to become quite complicated managing each system according to its own merits; it will certainly cost more time calculating what the situation is after each round of matches, and also when having to think about and place bets with different stakes.
If the money is already in the bank, then increase stakes across the board. Micro-managing interferes with the synergy of the portfolio approach.
Looking more in-depth at the 2016 and 2016-17 campaigns, expanding upon the calculations, and thinking the thing through, we have decided that keeping it simple is the better approach. Manage the portfolio as a whole. The detrimental effect of losing rounds (stop loss incidence) will be tempered more by the benefits of greater leaps forward if ratchet triggers are based on total profits.
I hope this is clear and thanks for your valuable contribution.
Hello Right Winger,
i did a lot of research and paper trading to get familiar with the HDAFU Tables.
My biggest problem at the moment is to identify false odds at oddsportal.
If you have a big gap between the upper and lower inflection point there is no problem.
But if there is a small gap, two things can happen.
You bet on the wrong games or you miss the right ones.
I give you two examples:
Russian Premier League:
09.08.2017 FK Rostov – Dynamo Moscow 1:0
Highest odds for home win: 2.2 (Tipico). The payout is 104 %. The timestamp shows (opening odds)
If the upper inflection point would be at 2.16 you don´t bet on the game when you trust oddsportal. The majority of all bookmakers are under 2.0 for the home win.
My interpretation: False odds.The right decision is to bet on the game. Pinnacle is at 1.98. It was a winner.
Czech 1.Liga:
13. August 2017 16:00 Teplice – Jablonec 1:1
Highest odds for a draw: 3.75 (bet365). The payout is 100,8%. The majority of all bookmakers are under 3.6 for a draw.
If your lower inflection point is above 3.65 you would bet on this game. I use a multibookmaker platform like vodds. The highest odds for a draw at kickoff was 3.59.
My interpretation: False odds. I guess i was wrong here. The Payout is 100,8 %, looks Ok and the time stamp from bet365 shows the last change 15 minutes before the kick off. The price was not available on my multibookmaker platform with Pinnacle and Betfair. I thought this game has false odds. I missed a game which was a winner ?
You wrote an article “How to find false odds at oddsportal”. The examples are very obivious. A Game with a payout above 140 % payout.
I bought the the english premier league HDAFU Table. I found no payout above 101 %.
When i check the odds at oddsportal i find games with higher payout for the english premier league. It must take you hours to correct all the odds above 101 % payout.
My questions:
Is a game with more than 101 % payout a game with potential false odds?
Can Betfair without commission be an indicator to check if the highest oddsportal odds are Ok ?
Can you give me some hints what you do to check if the game has false odds when it´s not so obvious?
Thanks for your tremendous work
Hi Corner,
Wow! Just a few questions there – you’ll have to forgive me if my answers are short and sweet…
1) Yes, it does take hours to manually correct odds in connection with our products. We have to do it simply because there is no reliable benchmark source of odds available (free or paid) anywhere in the Net.
2) You will find it difficult to find arbitrage on any 1X2 set of odds (i.e. payout above 100%) in the final few minutes before kick-off, but don’t confuse positive payout (underround) with overround – they are exact opposites.
3) The vast majority of games in the final moments before kick-off will therefore have a payout less than 100%. You should check anything with 100% payout or over before committing to the bet. This should be quite obvious on Oddsportal by looking at the time stamps of the offending prices.
4) Don’t forget that the vast majority of your bets will probably be safely inside the inflection points. It is probably better not to worry about boderline decisions as they will only cost you time.
If you are still unsure then make a rule for yourself. If it’s a favourite or a home win and the price is questionable (i.e. is it in or outside the lower inflection point), make a decision to treat all such imposters in the same fashion. In other words, include them all, or exclude them all. It won’t make much difference to your bottom line. It’s only when you include some and exclude others that you create an imbalance not only in the possible results, but also in your own mind as to whether you are doing the right thing or not.
If it’s a draw, an underdog or an away win, I would probably err on the side of caution and decide not to include them if they are on the upper inflection point.
5) Regarding small gaps between the inflection points, I’m not sure how small the gaps are you are referring to, but have a look at the Summer and Winter League campaign workbooks to see the gaps we had in each system we chose.
6) Don’t forget that the results of both campaigns, although pretty good, were not always based on best price in the market at the time of bet placement. In fact, the majority of bets were placed at prices below the peak price, simply because we didn’t have access to the best price.
If you are in further doubt, use the best price available to you as the benchmark. Again, in the majority of cases, it will fall comfortably between your two inflection points. Just make a rule and stick to it for the borderline cases. Concentrate on the big picture first, and attend to the details if you have the time.
7) In your Oddsportal account settings, you can set a commission rate for Betfair and also choose whether or not to show Betfair odds net of the commission payable. This may provide you with the indicator you are looking for. Otherwise, it’s a case of checking the bookmaker odds for accuracy.
I hope this answers your questions and thanks for your contribution.
Hi again Right Winger,
Just a question regarding the timing of bets. Obviously it’s important to wait until the hour before kickoff for those bets that are close to the inflection points, but how important is it to keep this timing for the bets that are obviously going to land between our points. For example, if I have inflection points of 1.6-2.5 and there’s a bet tomorrow priced at 2.1 is it okay to place your bets early on that?
Thanks!
Hi Alex,
We regularly do place some bets well in advance if we have an inkling that the price is going to drop the nearer to kick-off it gets (usually favourites or home wins).
However, if the price drifts beyond the lower inflection point, we will lay it back for an arbitrage profit.
As I’ve said to others before in these comments sections, start looking at odds movements in Oddsportal from the opening of the market right up until the close (check the time stamps). You will then hopefully get a good idea how the market operates (leagues differ according to their popularity/liquidity), and identify the different strategies employed by the bookmakers to obtain their share of the market on an event.
Once you have that knowledge, you can anticipate with a deal of accuracy how the market is going to move, and make your bet decision based on the best/most profitable times to place bets.
Remember, the HDAFU tables provide a benchmark for the close of the ante post market. You only need this one reliable benchmark during ante post to make the most profitable bet placement decisions if you can afford to put the work/time in observing and teaching yourself about the market dynamics.
I hope this helps.
Are Belgian draws killing anyone else?
The loosing streak is painful indeed. Only 15,6 % draws so far. 24,6% was the average in the last five years.
Hi right winger,
I still have a couple of questions, I hope you can shed some light on them.
1. I started some first half seasons when they were already in play. I left some profit on the table (I calculated back), but I also calculated the projected profit and there was enough still on the table to make it worth my while. So I went ahead and started placing bets on these leagues. Was this a mistake?
2. Reason I am asking this is because well, I am executing operation nosedive over the last two weekends. Don’ get me wrong,this is all 100% my own choice, so I am not having a dig, but maybe you could acknowledge the last two weekends were not the greatest? I have reason to believe I am not far off the systems that you yourself use. Any perceptive person could reach this conclusion, and I am sure you know what I mean by that comment. It would help me to have my soul a bit less destroyed maybe. And if you have a totally different experience, well, that would mean I am doing something completely wrong.
3. Now to something more concrete. I have read and appplied your comments about the two russian bookies. However, I had a situation yesterday where the Roma away game was between my two inflection points with every bookie except one, Tempobet.
I checked their website and indeed Odds Portal was showing the right info. So I didn;t play this game due to the fact that one bookie offered this game outside my inflecton points. Was I right in doing that?
I hope you can take the time to address this post, I would very much appreciate it!
Hello again AM0751,
I think I’ve gone some way to answering your questions in mine below (21/08/2017 3.58pm) and above (21/08/2017 5.13pm and 5.21pm).
Tempobet is a funny one. Difficult to get an account with and sometimes offering odds well above anyone else. Sometimes, you find the odds shown on Oddsportal are available, and sometimes they most definitely are not. The API connection Oddsportal has with Tempobet is definitely unreliable.
We do not have an account with Tempobet and tend to discard their results from our thinking. From what you have said, I think the answer from our perspective would have been to ignore Tempobet and place the bet.
As I have said before in reply to other contributors, if in doubt, go with the majority viewpoint. Outlier prices are usually offered to gain market share and don’t necessarily reflect what is going on with the market in general.
AM0571
I am happy to share my feedback and experience of how the last 6 Gameweeks have gone for me.
To simplify things, whatever I bet per game I will call 1 unit. My unit amount is £50. So after 4 Gameweeks, with 8 systems in flow at that point, things were going great, with 23.72 units of profit/£1186 in the bank. Weeks 5 and 6 have been awful for me, losing approx. 6 units in week 5 and approx. 12 units in week 5. I’m now sitting back at 6 units of profit/£300.
The systems I started out with initially, Poland Underdog, Russian Favourite, French Ligue 1 favourite, French Ligue 2 Draw, Czech republic Draw, Portugal Underdog, all started out winning. Last weekend Netherlands Draw joined the fray and has been poor performing on both weeks 5 and 6. Turkey Favourite started poorly on week 5. Both Spain and Germany started out poorly this weekend, as did Italy Favourite. Some other systems have suffered small losses or breaking even.
So, the latest systems joining the action all have started poorly and thus combined to bring down the profits gained by the other systems.
It certainly was a humbling experience to see such a big profit reduction so quickly. So I can relate to your experience to a degree. On the plus side I haven’t lost money yet, but can confirm that the last 2 weeks have not been great for me personally. However, I’m looking at things from the point of view that these slow starting systems can recover, and that will lead to a spike in the profits.
I never thought that all the systems would have performed brilliantly right off the bat – that would be unrealistice. I was hoping that after getting up to just under 24 units of profit there would be a period of consolidation where I was breaking even, but I had a good period immediately followed by a bad one. None of us know how the results will line up or what the future holds. So for me it is a case of trusting the data, trusting my analysis of it, and hoping in the long run, with sound money management and patience profits will build up again!
In response to Michael, AM0751 and Simon (all 21/08/2017 above),
Firstly, because we (Soccerwidow.com) are running Summer and Winter League portfolios concurrently, our overall results have not been hugely curtailed by the start to the 2017-18 Winter League seasons, although I agree with some of the detrimental experiences you have highlighted above.
I think the ‘new starters’ dilemma can be summed up with an analogy. The football betting calendar year is like a fast-moving conveyor belt. Once you are on it, you are swept away until you decide you’ve had enough. Getting off is easy enough – you just stop betting.
But like anything continuously in motion, if you’ve never been on the ride before (i.e. portfolio betting), it is likely that you will stumble getting on it at first. You have to get on somewhere, but there are no hints with statistics to tell you when the best moment arrives.
Calculating winning streaks and losing streaks is all good and well, but there is no way of knowing when they will arrive. If you get on the conveyor in the middle of a losing streak, then I’m afraid it is hard lines, but if your portfolio is large enough and has a balanced risk profile, you will recover over time and begin to pick up.
The unpredictable starts to some seasons is a subject already covered in the blog. You may wish to refresh your memories for a little reassurance that things will settle down and follow statistical patterns eventually. Read also the Goal Distribution article, if you haven’t already done so.
The key to portfolio betting is to keep the rhythm going – try and bet all year round so that there is no time gap in your portfolio. The numbers will eventually support themselves as you begin to mix Summer and Winter Leagues in the same round of matches.
A larger portfolio will also provide you with better financial control – Employ the ratchet and stop loss mechanisms to the portfolio as a whole.
Alternatively, get on the conveyor belt with a set target in mind. Stop betting when you have achieved it. Start afresh when you are ready. Treat every new target as a separate ‘campaign’, but expect the possibility of stumbling at the beginning of each. Building anything up from nothing is never plain sailing at the start. (I can’t begin to tell you how hard it was for me to build-up an insurance brokerage from scratch, single-handedly in the 1990’s).
And don’t worry about a rocky ride to the start of a season in some leagues. The statistics will even themselves out. As per the Winter League Campaign article above, the final result should resemble a Poisson distribution curve – the two extremities of the curve will contain a few systems which fail (at the negative end), some that will surpass expectations (at the positive end), whilst the rest (the majority) will be in the big bulge in the middle.
Both patience and nerve are virtues in gambling. If you have ‘value’ on your side (i.e. betting above the zero odds every time), then you will make money in the long run. It’s obvious.
Hi right winger, Michael and Simon,
Thank you for your feedback, your words acknowledge that I am indeed not crazy, I am just experiencing a dip. I iwll keep plugging away.
Right winger, just adding, because I think you missed point 3 in my previous post, did I handle this case correctly>
Cheers!
@simon
I am doing the same as you as well as other leagues too. I was up 3 points in week 1 and it has been downhill since. Up until tonight I was about 7 points down on a rollercoaster and tonight has been terrible with another 7 points lost. I started with a 30 point bank and could go below 50% with a bad day tomorrow.
The graphs look good with the inflection points chosen and I am wondering if anyone is actually up so far in what seems a horrible start to the winter leagues.
AM0751 & Timmyp,
I hope you are both employing a stop loss mechanism suitable to your levels of stakes as per the explanation on page 4 of this article?
Remember, you must protect what you have when the troughs arrive.
Just a thought.
Hello Timmy,
just want to share with you my results so far.
I started with a 11000 euro bank and 300 stakes. I am 9685 euro in profit at the end of week 6 with week 7 in progress as we speak.
Week 1: 9 bets, 15 euro profit
Week 2: 21 bets, 2865 euro profit
Week 3: 23 bets, 3579 euro profit
Week 4: 36 bets, 3571 euro profit
Week 5: 50 bets, 2491 euro profit
Week 6: 68 bets, -2836 euro loss
Week 6 was a very bad and unlucky week with many games lost in the final minutes, but that is part of the game so no complains so far for a system that is giving me huge profits in little more than a month.
I am also using the stop-loss strategy explained by Right Winger and my current bet size is 330 euro for Week 7.
Good luck with your system!
And a big thanks to Right Winger and Soccerwidow for the invaluable knowledge they have taught me through this website.
Hi right winger,
;-
I am indeed employing a stop loss. And I guess I am learning as I go along, hence the following:
I have been reading all articles and your comments to find if my question was already asked, but it does not seem so.
My question is as follows: you have mentioned several times that there are some problematic bookies, namely Marathonbet, 1XBET and Tempobet.
You mentioned that as they are high turnover, low margin bookies, and that their odds tend to change fast. But this goes for more bookies, like Island Casino or 5Dimes (or Pinnacle of course!), yet you never mentioned you excluded these from your analysis when collecting highest odds.
Can you explain to me what the difference is?
Reason I am asking is in your winter campaign spreadsheet, I see sometimes you *do* include Marathonbet pricing (with both winning and losing games, so this is not some thinly veiled accusation, just an observation).
Is it purely a timestamp issue that makes you adjust for the highest odds in your HDAFU tables?
Hi AM0751,
Thanks for your comment.
Yes, Oddsportal’s API’s are unreliable and/or slow in updating where Marathonbet, 1xbet and Tempobet are concerned.
Tempobet, for example, will show best odds on many occasions, usually on the home team, but these odds will sometimes be days old; occasionally they are as little as 45 minutes old, but never close to being ante post market closing odds.
Consequently, being so far above the rest of the market, these odds stick out like a sore thumb and are an unreliable benchmark. If they were true, everyone would be betting on them (especially traders and arbitrageurs), and they would have a hard job balancing their accounts. I’ve checked Tempobet’s sites (they have several in different languages) against Oddsportal’s odds prior to kick-off, and there are sometimes marked differences between the different Tempobet sites at the same moment in time.
So, in answer to your question, it is most definitely a time stamp issue, which is why you will sometimes find Marathonbet’s odds included in the analyses. Their odds are sometimes best in the market (just slightly ahead of their rivals and obtainable), within a minute or so of kick-off.
As I’ve mentioned before, use the majority opinion (i.e. what the rest of the bookmakers indicate), rather than the guidance of one or two outliers, in order to form your bet placement decisions.
I agree that the process may seem a little awkward at first, and it would certainly not be an issue if we could select/deselect bookmakers from Oddsportal’s compulsory list, but with time you will get used to it.
AM0751,
I may be able to answer your question. It was my understanding at the time, and have since seen this consistently myself at odds portal, that with Marathonbet, they are in nearly all cases, especially with underdog bets, offering considerably higher odds than the rest of the market. On that note I remember RW saying for that reason, Marathonbet odds had been discarded/downgraded. That would then give a set of highest odds that were reflective of the market.
So this in turn has a bearing on the actual bet placement itself. For example if you have inflection points of 3.5 and 4.5 and every single book maker is within that range apart from marathon bet, then it is a valid selection, since the market agrees. So place the bet. Of course, for the purposes of taking the best odds, the bet can be placed with marathon bet. That would explain why you see marathon bet prices in the winter campaign sheet.
On the other hand, again with inflection point of 3.5 and 4.5, if all the bookmakers are say at 3.3 or lower and marathon bet is at 3.6, this is not a valid selection and should not be bet on.
Thats how I understand it with marathon bet specifically – its an issue with there odds being higher in lots of cases than the general market and so not a reflection of that market. I didn’t think it to be due to an issue with time stamps for marathon bet.
I have seen many instances, however, where books on odds portal have odds that seem very high in relation to the market average. And when I check these odds for accuracy at the bookmaker website itself, I find the odds do not exist anymore. I find this to be the case a LOT with Tempobet. Other books I have seen this happen with are Betolimp. There are other cases with other bookmakers but less frequently so.
What I do in these cases, where the odds seem so out to step from the rest of the market is check the website itself to see what the current odds are. I would suspect, and RW could confirm this, those odds that are out of step with reality, such as Templet odds, are the ones corrected by looking at timestamps. With Marathon bet, I’m sure thats not a timestamp issue.
Hope thats helpful. And RW will correct me if I’m wrong!
Hi AM0751,
i will share with you my experiences with Oddsportal and the APIs so far.
I have encountered many times unreliable odds in my selections (old timestamps). Usually what i do is open the website and check the real odds for that particular event. If i cannot do so (because of geographic or IP restrictions) i generally tend to discard them from the analysis and move to the second best, as long as they are reliable. I don’t discard any bookmaker solely based on the name. For example, i never ignore Marathonbet odds if the timestamp is recent and the odds are accurate. Honestly it is a very simple and straight forward process for me. If the top odds fit in, and are authentic, i bet. If not, i don’t. Regardless of which bookmakers are they from (from the list of bookmakers shared by Right Winger), if the timestamp is recent and the odd is accurate i use that value. I also never place a bet more than 15 minutes before kick off, except if i notice that a particular odd is falling constantly but still in the range by far.
Hope this helps!