I love following tipsters. It comes from a very early realisation on my part that I had no skill at all in finding an edge in a sport and being able to exploit it to make money. And believe me, years ago I tried. And tried. And then tried some more. Had I not been much more than a callow youth, I would hope that my dumb male pride wouldn’t have prevented me from admitting as much to myself. As it was my lack of humility was ultimately I’m sure, the sole reason for the cashier in the local bookie – who knew I was underage – to always welcome me into the shop with open arms. Even offered me a job at one point as a ‘Board Marker’. That’s how keen he was to keep me on the premises!
Then I found tipsters, and suddenly there was light at the end of the tunnel. The one part of my personality that would have made me a good soldier – and I mean one – is that I can follow instructions and orders, presuming I could see why by doing so I might benefit.
And now having said all that, can I just say how much I enjoy using the Bookie Bashing Tools to search for value in the markets? I’ve watched all of Tom Brownlee’s videos on his site, many more than two or three times. I’ve picked snippets up from the Bookie Bashing Podcast. And putting things together to help me search for +EV bets is really rewarding. I can recommend it. Better than bloody Sudoku!
I’ve tried to concentrate on one angle at a time. Primarily around goal scorers initially, particularly in the Any Time Goalscorer market. Then it was the Enhanced Specials offered up daily by BetDaq and Matchbook (is it me or is value there just becoming a little less common – more people catching on?). And now it’s attacking the ‘Player to be Shown a Card’ market.
Tom was talking about how folk had told him how lucrative this has been recently, and seems to be profiting himself. And although it is ridiculously early days for me as yet, I’ve got off to a really strong start. Having started last Thursday, I’ve played in 11 matches since, and six of them produced profit. All told, I’m standing at an ROI of 29.9%.
Now I’m not saying that that sort of figure is any way sustainable. Truth be told, I’d settle on about 15% of that. Going to be fascinating to see what happens from here. I have a suspicion that as more people cotton on, the edge may erode. Let’s hope not.
And that brings me on to another subject raised by Tom in a recent Bookie Bashing podcast.
Call it plagiarism, cheating, downright fraudulent…copying others work and then seeking to benefit commercially from it by passing methods off as your own is bang out of order. And my worry is that if this happens, the likes of Tom are simply going to clam up so that they protect their edge. They will not share their thoughts and processes with us mere mortals, and why would they?
The beauty of Bookie Bashing, I find, is that if you allow yourself to be, you can be properly and very well educated. I would hate for that to stop, if for no other reason than I find listening to clever people who know more about their specialty than I ever will, is fascinating. To me, that was the thrill of the SmartBash. Trust me, there were some very clever people there, very much worth listening to.
And finally, and on the theme of clever, knowledgeable people – if you haven’t already, make sure you listen to the SBC Podcast with Matthew Trenhaille (Trench). Seriously, is there anything about betting, market making, bookmakers, etc that he doesn’t have a huge depth of knowledge about? And is there anyone else who can put their thoughts and knowledge across in a more easy-to-understand and entertaining way? I could listen to the man for hours.
I guess that makes me a Fan Boy. Who would have thought…?
