England v India

This draw price is some head-scratcher in the 2nd Test, theres two days left..







Er, we had 417 runs today - Eng are only 374 ahead, in theory India could chase that in a day, in theory obviously because Eng wont be declaring. I suppose the most likely scenario is Eng ahead by 500ish (or close enough to it) by lunch tomorrow and then India have to bat five sessions to win or draw. They'll hardly spend the guts of two days blocking, and if Eng bat for 25 overs at RR5 (its 4.36 atm) tomorrow, that leaves 155 overs - 500/155 = 3.22 which is hardly shut up shop stuff. Its hard to know whats the right or wrong price until Eng finish their innings I suppose. I'd have the draw bigger but at the same time wouldnt fancy India to chase 500 so where do you put them in at. Just on the time scale of things, if they last 155 overs you'd have to think they'd be close enough to the target anyway, at least seeing 417 runs in a day would make you think that anyway. Realistically if India do decide to block, you could see Engs bowling attack crawling all over them, you cant just block for five sessions. Wait until Eng post the score and go from there I suppose, in the end it'll be an Eng win more likely than not, but not without India "looking like winning" at some stage? The draw price is barking anyway, win or lose, funny thing is it'll probably go lower in the morning.

Anyway, I'm glad I have a good book on that because yesterday wasnt enjoyable with Kildare crashing out. 1pt up in added time, in extra time, and lose, FFS. They were 3pts down with less than 10 minutes to go before we went to extra time so I suppose cant complain too much, I thought we had it won in extra time though. Maybe its Dublins year after all? They'll surely find some way to bottle it though, could you picture Dublin winning an All Ireland, it'd be like, erm, Liverpool winning the Premiership. I did well yesterday anyway to limit the damage to under a tenner after having €244 at 1.7 Kildare, got a sense it was coming apart so ducked out, thank god for the Eircom wi-fi in Croker.

The 1st Test feels like ages ago..







That was a tough five days, I'd have liked to have been more aggressive laying the draw but didnt have the bottle at the time, thats all really - that was the play, I knew it at the time too, but just didnt have the bottle. Its difficult (and its the same with this Test too), the odds are short but it just keeps coming and coming at you, draw backers are a relentless bunch. Even this match, surely backing 4.2 from this position cant leave you winning long term, and backing odds on on day one cant be a good idea either, just asking for trouble. But they keep coming at you non stop.

I had a few days off in between the Tests and its amazing how things change, I went for lunch and golf a couple of the days.. during Galway and Goodwood were all going for lunch and golf - that would have never happened a few years ago. Even the in-running edge with Galway being on RTE didnt attract me. Maybe were all just gettin' old. Or gettin' sense!

I didnt see any races live but Frankel was just awesome, what can you say about him.. he just has gears. And lots of them..

24/07/2011

Its not been the greatest week in terms of enjoying sport but its been OK on Betfair.

The King George yesterday has got to be one of the most unsatisfactory races I've ever seen - between the false/slow early pace, poor Rewilding breaking down, Workforce hanging, St Nic letting the first two get first run (although wouldnt have changed the result), after looking forward to it so much it turned out to be a horrible race.

In terms of the J O'B ride on St Nic, now I'm not saying the result would have been different at all, but for the future - as seen at Chester and Epsom, a bit of hands and heels before pulling out the whip works much better for him. Yesterday coming round the bend Joseph was sat there looking cool and then when he went to say go the first thing he did was give him two cracks (and to be fair he responded) but at Chester and Epsom he was wound up gradually before hitting 5th gear and taking off. IMO he was rode yesterday as if he could go from 1st gear to 5th just by two cracks of the whip and a "lets go," he wont overtake Group 1 horses like that, you have to give him time. Anyway, it wouldnt have changed the result but if he heads to the Arc thats the way I'd like to see him rode - he took off towards the end of the race at Epsom having come under pressure a good bit out, he can make ground hands and heels, get into a rhythm, then whip him and he takes off. If ever there was a KF ride for the Arc its him.

I'm slightly secretly glad he didnt win though because when I was backing him for the Arc, he was 33/1 for the King George too. And I thought at the time (before he ran this season) that he would have all the 1M2F races open to him too, so would skip the KG. It only turned out after him running that you could see he was an out and out 1M4Fer.

And as if my heart wasnt broken enough by that race, Wexford a few hours later were 5pts ahead in the second half, 3pts ahead after one minute of added time and managed to somehow end up losing. I dont even know how, FFS. At least Kildare have got a good draw in the Quarter Finals against Donegal, then we could possibly meet Dublin in the semis, the other semi looks to be Kerry v Cork which should be a cracker, I'm probably a bit bias towards Kildare but if they turn out to be the semis IMO its the four best teams in the country at the moment and it'll be fantastic for the GAA. I'd love to see Tyrone beat Dublin though (presuming Tyrone beat Roscommon).

If the Wexford result wasnt a kick in the balls, this definitely was, handy green - only 20 balls to go for a result and get paid, oh wait look, its raining, void..






The same feckin' thing happened Monday as well! Both times I had CMM insurance but for only half of the green I had on the match odds, I hate the rain. I have no match odds results this week at all - only rain results.

Its been very hard work over on the 1st Eng v India Test too, the draw started day 1 at odds on and here we are after day 4, and its still odds on. Its bounced around a bit, today it looked like it was out with the washing but then came back in and gave me a bit of trouble. ATM my book is like this:







I'm happy to be equal green (because I havent got a feckin' clue whats going to happen tomorrow), but am a little bit disappointed even with that because a few hours earlier I had this:







I want that book back! Ah no, but that last two hours was a mare really I was all over the place. The draw coming back in has caused the main damage - I'm not sure if I'm giving the Eng attack too much respect, even though it'll be a day 5 pitch tomorrow it is Lords after all and a Lords day 5 pitch isnt a normal day 5 pitch. Not sure what will happen tomorrow - I know I dont want to be opposing The Wall and VVS though, will sit out of the market until one of them goes even if it means letting the draw reach 1.3 or something. It should be a good day whatever happens anyway.

I havent given much thought after passing the yearly goal last week either - I think I'll just go along steady and see what happens really, I'll re-assess that stance if things start going pear shaped. So far I havent done anything mad like buy a dancing monkey or invest in Irish banks so I'm not doing too bad.

Yearly Goal Reached

I use the word 'goal' because probably having 'targets' isnt a great idea in the general scheme of things, but everyone knows you have to reach a certain figure (or average it over a few years) to stay gambling, so its nice to pass the magic €7.5k online so early in the year.

When I started the blog it was March, so I went from March to March as my year, but when I dropped the laptop and needed a new hard drive (never check your emails after Coppers, lesson learned) I lost all the early figures so now go as normal January to December. I'm not sure on the numbers but I recall January and February being losing months (or ones of considerable struggle) in 2010, and this year I was sat on €30.2k at the end of December and then first week in March I had reached the grand total of €30.3k - that works out at winning on average €12.50 per week - er, its a long way off but for some reason I think booking a holiday next January/February is probably not the worst idea. For whatever reason I cant seem to do anything right those months, nor can I explain why.

On the plus side of that winning €50 short of €9k in four months and a week is promising for the future (I always envisioned having to quit gambling if I had children etc, you know yourself) but maintaining those figures would mean I could continue gambling, but obviously thats 10 odd years away so its not really important but anyway.

In the more immediate future - I would like another 'goal' to work towards to keep me focused. Just to keep myself from going mad, getting lazy, I have good discipline in general but its nice to have a "reason" for having good discipline and a bit of structure or rules. For example, I lost €230ish on Roscommon today, Roscommon are hardly a strong GAA team are they! And gambled on the golf all weekend, even though I know I'm bad (lost €12ish after being €175 green) and had €350 on Kildare last night - even though the odds were incredible, at one stage Meath brought it back to level and it was looking dicey (and adding that to my cash bets wasnt really an enjoyable number!), I havent lost €300+ on a Betfair market since January either so would like to keep that for as long as possible and not start doing daft things 'just because I can and it makes no real difference.'

The plan is to not change anything anyway, as always it if aint broke dont fix it, go for dinner tonight (been waiting for the golf to settle to post and I'm bloody starving!) and take a few days off before the Eng v India 1st Test and then decide what to do or where to go for the rest of the year.



By the way, the boxing on the P&L is the same from last week so doesnt count, and its the big day tomorrow with the new PC charges coming.. be interesting to see what effect (if any) it has on the site.

10/07/2011

I know I'm a day early but the Test match wont finish until around 11 tonight and I'll be nackered, so going to stick all todays action into next week. I wouldnt say that many people are sat there on a Saturday afternoon at four thinking "feck me, cant wait for Monday," Test cricket is hard going.

I have my book squared atm because I literally have no idea whats going to happen tonight.







I think the India price is fair enough at 1.38, I'd have them 1.4 to back though rather than to lay but thats not a major difference. Windies are 81 ahead with 4 wickets left, couple of questions - 1) How many will they get? and 2) Will India chase it? IMO India might shut up shop if Windies set them 170ish with one and a bit sessions left, but thats asking the last 4 wickets to put on nearly 100, which I wouldnt say will happen however Chanderpaul is still there on 73. Get him in the first 5 overs later and its probably GSM India, 1.4 is fair enough - you'd expect India to win, although there maybe a few bumps along the way without an early wicket. If I had a strong opinion I'd have all my green on it but cant call it.

Apart from that its been a quiet enough week, I've been doing the Test since Wednesday so only had Monday and Tuesday really, I had this book on Monday night.. and ended up winning €2.






I never learn. Thats one thing I want to improve on, it suits me to have all my green on the outcome I fancy, but I should be able to see when things are going tits up better and do something about it. I'm strongly against going all green just for the sake of it though (and that 1.75 hit 1.25 after), it should be when the odds suggest going equal rather than just because you have green one side and nothing the other. Getting rid of red remains the main goal anyway sure.

Kildare won yesterday too! So onwards and upwards, hopefully we avoid Cork in the next round, think the draw is tonight I'm not sure. That was the best moment of the week, the worst moment was this email..











Funnily enough Ems signed into my email on Wednesday night and immediately said "What have you done now?" I havent done anything! I've had no account with Stan James since they closed my last one about two years ago, I'm presuming that email means I'm barred from Betpack and not Stan James, SJ own them (or oversee them or something) if I'm not mistaken. Betpack are made up of Bamburys, Hacketts, John Mulhollands, Terry Rogers, Pat Toolans, Track Bookmakers and Tullys so effectively I'm barred from all of them, great! And the last time I had a bet of three figures with them (€200)? March. The account was limited after mind, but still I havent done anything of major seriousness.

I love the way they say "due to betting patterns on this account the decision has been made to close it," using the words "batting patterns" is like something you see on Sky Sports News when crooked jockeys are being investigated.

The disappointment of that email has been made up by this email from my friend..

Ah man I was doing some temporary office work in down syndrome ireland in bluebell there. I sent an email after to the manager to thank them for the chance to work there.

Did the worst typo ever signing off and instead of 'kind regards' I typed 'kind retards' by mistake and sent it. Dam spell checker didn't stop it either!
Never got a response back to the email, they must have thought I was completely taking the piss!!

An update on my horse SeeSea too - after her first workout its been decided that her legs arent strong enough to stand up to the training of a racehorse so she wont have a future and has been packed off to stud. Thank god we leased her, given it was her first workout we dont even lose a months training fees which is great, and now were back to looking at unraced and unnamed bumper horses for the National Hunt season. I almost feel a bit sorry already for the poor horse were going to pick, given our luck and track record the poor bugger will almost definitely end up in a can. Leasing is a massive advantage though, I mean if you bought a horse and in her first canter back something went wrong you'd be gutted, however with leasing you just move on pretty quickly, sounds harsh but its the way it goes really. We deserve a winner after all weve been through! So far weve had two horses, one race (2nd), one dead and one retired. As I said, god help the next one.

Moving On

Well the dust seems to have settled now on the new PC changes, and while there are some noises coming from people about moving, the general thing seems to be nothing has changed.

I think you have to be very self centered when things like this happen - obviously taking 60% of someones winnings (without them cheating) is immoral, BUT if it doesnt effect you, well then theres not much to get hyped up about. Certainly from my point of view (and I'm sure many others) it makes no real sense to up sticks from Betfair and head to Betdaq where liquidity is low and its now highly possible that whatever market is there could be a shark tank.

I took two screen shots at the same time Saturday on the cricket, I know everyone knows this already, but theres not much competition is there:















It doesnt kick in until the 18th, so we'll only see what really happens after that I suppose, if anything.

Interestingly enough Betfair released their profits for the year this week too, and in the comments read: "But it said revenues, which increased 15.4 per cent to £393.3million, 'could have been stronger' after they were hit by declining bets on horse racing and poker and 'outages' due to technical problems on its websites." I wrote here towards the end of last year, at the time I'd had enough, was giving up the horses in a serious way and settling for a less than part-time interest, that my generation (the next generation) wont have the same interest in horse racing as the last one, and that it will only continue to go down. I didnt think it'd start happening now, the new breed of gamblers are being brought up on football, tennis, cricket, sports like that - you have less options in the market (so its easier to grasp) and less smoke and mirrors.

On another note, do you think Betfair might apply the 60% PC to the poker site? Will they fuck. The place would be empty in a matter of hours, imagine Pokerstars doing that - it'd never happen. Monopolies are no craic.

Anyway, delighted with the boxing going the distance last night, I said Monday I was happy enough taking 5/2 and then WH went 7/2, it was only 3/1 on Betfair. I see Sky Sports News are talking about a rematch, oh dear. ALTHOUGH, if you were Wladimir Klitschko and someone offered you a whole heap of cash to beat a guy youve beaten already, why wouldnt you take it? He won easily. As for toegate, erm, when I first heard him open his mouth and say it I thought "Oh no, dont say that" it sounds so bad and makes him look terrible - even if its true. You cant act like Billy Big Bollocks before a fight and then say "oh my baby toe" after youve been beaten 11-1. TOETAL FAILURE.

Small bit gutted this week with the rain in the Test match. Fancied India strongly and had worked myself into a good position:






Then the heavens opened and we lost time on all four days after (only got 25 overs on day 2), Windies finished 7 down at the end, and would have gone close themselves if it wasnt for Chanderpauls 12 off 87 balls, a SR of 13.79 (I wanted to die watching him bat), I finished with this:







Feckin' rain. Its hurricane season out there ATM so I wouldnt be overly keen being heavy against the draw for the last Test, although the carrot dangles in front of your eyes because Windies dont hang around for long batting, theyve very rarely made it past 80 overs this summer. I still end up losing on cricket this week because I've had a mare on England v Sri Lanka, lost €70 1st ODI and €300 2nd ODI - a few overs away from a flip flop with Morgan there and sure he went and it was 1.1 and goodnight.

On GAA matters, Kerry hit 1.05 (I was on Cork, oh dear) today before bouncing back to odds against - it worked out OK in the end. Hope to God Kildare dont get Cork in the qualifiers, thats if we beat Laois in Portlaoise on Saturday though, which isnt a given. Nothing really sticks out next weekend, London (11/10) v Waterford (5/4) could be of interest, I think thats maybe a slight overreaction to London winning the last game, however Waterford are no great shakes and having to travel to London means its probably beat left alone. I thought Meath (4/7) might be worth an interest to beat Galway (Galway were woeful against Mayo) but historically those games are close enough so in-running is probably the way forward in life there.