According to renowned author Malcolm Gladwell, to become truly good at something takes at least 10,000 hours of honest endeavour and continued practice.
Be it the Beatles playing every night for 8 hours in Hamburg before they made it big, or in our cases, an expert who spends his life poring over betting markets, there is much to be learnt from those who have put in the hard yards.
Its one reason why each month at the Smart Betting Club, we conduct an interview with an expert from the betting industry, to try and tap into their knowledge base for the benefit of our members.
In doing so we can get answers to questions such as:
- How exactly do they make money betting?
- And most importantly…how can you do the same?
All of this is why we were so delighted when the Times and Betfair betting columnist Ed Hawkins agreed to answer some of our questions in our latest magazine.
Gambling Around The World
For some of you, Ed Hawkins will need no introduction as he is quickly developing a reputation as a top notch betting writer, winning the SJA betting writer of the year award for 2010 and 2011. He is perhaps most famous for his book ‘Sporting Chancer’, in which he gambles his way around the globe after The Sportsman betting daily paper folder.
With a father who was the racing correspondent for the Guardian, Ed was exposed to betting from an early age, experience that no doubt counted towards his 10,000 hours of practice getting good at it!
He is also a very shrewd betting tipster on that most English of sports – Cricket, where he also produces a Betfair column for all major matches.
Therefore with a bumper English summer of Cricket to look forward to with a top of the test table clash between England and South Africa as well as ODI matches against Australia to bet upon, we grilled Ed on just how he makes the sport profitable for him.
Why Specialising Is Key
What always comes through in interviews with experts like Ed is how specialising in specific sports has been so key for this success. Sometimes thought, you have to take it even further and concentrate on just a few very specific markets. He explained how he applies this to Cricket in our interview…
“SBC: How would you describe your early betting career and was their ever a eureka moment when you realised how to make cricket betting work?
ED: It was a process for sure. Knowing about cricket, spotting a good/average player, being aware of the vagaries of different pitches and conditions was useful as was betting knowledge. But that doesn’t mean you can be a good tipster. Not sure about a eureka moment but when you have so many opinions and information swirling around your head, and odds, too, I just thought ‘narrow it down to one thing that you know for sure and frame the tip around that’. That might have been a poor batting wicket or a good one.”
This kind of specialism is a recurring theme from many betting experts like Ed who know how valuable being more knowledgeable that a bookie on a specific betting market can be. Often they simply don’t have the resources or depth of knowledge to cover every single sport or league. They still however price many of these events up and so are very vulnerable to ‘niche betting’ experts.
In Cricket, Ed believes this to be the case in the Domestic game as he revealed that…
“County cricket is a gold mine. If you do your research and spend hours doing it, too, you will get a definitive edge over the layers. It is a small piece of the business for them so they don’t spend much time on it all.”
Knowing your strengths and weaknesses as a gambler can also be vital and again this no doubt comes down to his many years experience in betting. With this in mind, Ed revealed…
“I rarely like to make recommendations on bowler markets because I have a poor record but have a solid record with top bats on innings markets. I am disappointed if I don’t hit a target of around 40-45% profits for a season and thankfully I manage that. “
You can read our interview with Ed in full in the latest SBC Magazine, due out on Friday the 22nd June. Sign-up here to gain instant access to the Smart Betting Club.
Download Our 2011 Interview Special
If you want to sample some more SBC interviews than we have 4 from our 2011 magazines to share with you for free.
Those grilled in our Interview special include the likes of Malcolm Boyle and Hugh Taylor – two very well known names in the betting world and both of whom have years of experience betting and making money.
We also have our full interview with arguably the best racing tipster for many years – Laurence of Equine Investments as well as a chat with Goran Trpevksi – an ex professional footballer turned tipster expert par excellence!
Betting Experts Interview Special Free Download
If you enjoy these free interviews, then do consider a Smart Betting Club membership to obtain them all. Others interviewed recently include the likes of Ben Linfoot of Sporting Life, ex-bookmaker Phil Brown and Steve Lewis Hamilton – all of which you can access via our 6 year back catalogue.