Right, as promised. My plans and intentions for the new season with The Football Analyst.
The first thing I'll say is that following TFA is a different experience to following Skeeve, or Football Elite or any of the other football tipping services of which I have experience. With these, you get the bets, you place the bets, and there you go. What you see is what you get. With TFA though, it is a different set up. Here we have a number of systems, from which a subscriber can manufacture a mini-portfolio that suits their own, individual needs. I know Graeme has been helping a large number of his subscribers do just this over the summer, and if I know Graeme (and I do), it will have been a thorough job done too. Personally, I wanted to think of my own strategy. I wanted to analyse how best TFA could fit into my portfolio as a whole; that's one of it's beauties you see. You can make TFA what you want it to be.
So that's what I did. I created a strategy, then ran it past Graeme who couldn't see any major flaw in my thinking, so I think I'm good to go.
Here it is...
UK System 7-22 - 1pt staked on the Home bets, and 0.5pts staked on the AH(0) line on the Away bets.
Euro System E3-E7 - 0.5pts staked on the Home bets, and 0.25pts on the AH(0) line on the Away bets.
Where am I coming from with this?
OK, the first thing I did was to think about what I wanted from TFA this year in terms of the sort of service I wanted it to be. Looking at my football portfolio, I could see that I have lower turnover (in terms of number of bets) services such as Skeeve and Football Elite, and I have higher turnover services such as Summer Of Football and Form Lab Lite. What I needed was a service somewhere in the middle, perhaps giving 150 to 200 bets a season, there or thereabouts.
What I like about my choice of systems and the structure of the staking is that it allows me to raise the size of my stakes, which has always been my intention, whilst controlling levels of risk. I have to accept that some level of roi may be shaved off my returns through the utilisation of the AH(0) line (the equivalent to Draw No Bet), but historical roi figures are so high to render that essentially an irrelevance. This is especially so when you consider that a similar level of performance to last season will see more actual cash profit made as a result of the higher stakes and smaller banksize in terms of number of points required (see below for more on this).
I wanted to get involved with the new Euro systems too. I know this essentially goes against the grain of always watching to see how a new system or service develops; wait for it to prove itself as it were. However I'm prepared to make an exception based on my previous dealings with Graeme and my opinion of him as an analyst, the fact that I jumped straight into the UK systems when very first tested in a live environment and that didn't turn out too shabbily, and that looking at backtested performance, there's going to have to be one heck of a downturn before entering the realms of making any losses over the course of the season. However, the staking system means that the risk of following something new is reflected in the lower staking levels compared to those afforded the proven and established UK systems.
Why E3-E7? Well, it was notable from the backtested results that the European equivalent to System 7-22 gave out a lot more bets than it's UK counterpart. Bearing in mind that at this unproven stage, it probably makes sense to move up the 'selectivity ladder' of the Euro systems (ie. to those systems that filter more bets), I could see that E3-E7 did exactly what I was looking for. A high roi/ROC, proportionately the right number of bets to fit my template, plus the added benefit of providing what theoretically should represent bets that carry less risk.
Looking at the mini-TFA portfolio as a whole, and analysing the staking system I've mentioned, it means that the biggest stakes are going onto the bets that I can have most confidence in, ie. the UK 7-22 Home bets. The bets that I have least confidence in at this moment in time are the Euro Away bets, so to be staking four times more on the UK homes than on the Euro aways makes perfect sense.
As for bank sizes. Well Graeme ran the suggested portfolio through his machine and out popped the startling statistic that the biggest drawdown suffered historically was just 5.6 points. Erm, a bank of 11 points? No, not for this little bunny. 20 points for me. You know how I like to err on the side of caution. With a 20 point bank, I'm hopeful of an ROC around the 75% level. At the size of stakes that I'll be using, that would do me just fine. More than fine, in fact.
So in summary. I have a service that fits beautifully in the middle of the portfolio in terms of likely number of bets; that allows me to up my stakes significantly but by utilising the Asian Handicaps I can limit and control risk at the same time; small historical drawdowns; a high strike rate; and historically strong ROC performance. The one slight caveat I have at the moment is that more so than last year, I'm more restricted to using the Asian bookies than I was last season. Will this have an effect on the prices I can get? I wouldn't think so, not to any greatly detrimental effect anyway.
Now all we need are the bets. Not long to wait now.
Wednesday's Betting
Northern Monkey
One very small bet that came second.
Staked 0.375pts, -0.375pts
The Sportsman Racing
A run too bad to be true for today's selection.
Staked 0.5pts, -0.5pts
Winning Racing Tips
The same horse The Sportsman Racing picked was the first leg of an each way double, so no returns there.
Staked 0.5pts, -0.5pts
The Market Examiner
No joy from the two bets.
Staked 2pts, -2pts
Service X
Very small profit overnight with two winners from four bets.
Staked 10pts, +0.49pts
Sportyy
Dodged a bullet by missing the price on a bet that lost. Nice when it works that way. Elsewhere, a winner Nieminen to bt Kukushkin - 0.885/1) staked with twice the amount as another loser for a profit overall.
Staked 3pts, +0.77pts
Month to date figures...
Racing
Northern Monkey: Staked 45.625pts, +10.661pts, roi 23.36%
On The Nose: Staked 50.5pts, +14.112pts, roi 27.94%
The Sportsman Racing: Staked 4pts, -0.947pts, roi -23.68%
Winning Racing Tips: Staked 8.6pts, -0.686pts, roi -7.98%
The Market Examiner: Staked 33pts, -19.8pts, roi -60%
Total roi 13.67%
Sports
Football Elite: Staked 1pt, +/- (+/-£), roi 0%, ROC 0%
Summer Of Football: Staked 26pts, +9.785pts, roi 37.63%, ROC 48.92%
Skeeve (Asians): Staked 17pts, +0.274pts, roi 1.61%
Skeeve (Doubles): Staked 11pts, -1.672pts, roi -15.2%
Skeeve (Shortlist): Staked 4pts, -1.188pts, roi -29.7%
Skeeve Total: Staked 32pts, -2.586pts, roi -8.08%, ROC -3.23%
The Sportsman: Staked 0.8pts, +0.084pts, roi 10.5%, ROC 1.4%
Form Lab Lite: Staked 28pts, -3.995pts, roi -14.26%, ROC 7.99%
Sportyy: Staked 39.5pts, +17.651pts, roi 44.68%, ROC 22.06%
Service X: Staked 254.2pts, +42.888pts, roi 16.87%, ROC 42.88%
Total roi 15.35%
Grand Total: Staked £10,089.50, +£1,499.51, roi 14.86%
Rowan
ReplyDeleteAm I missing something here but didn't Graeme write that system E2-E7 was closest to 7-22 and that the system you are going to use E3-E7 he had reservations about or are you happy to continue with that one anyway.
Bob
Hi Bob,
DeleteIt's like I said in the blog, mate. You're right, E2-E7 is the closest Euro equivalent to 7-22, but it also throws up far more bets than 7-22. Therefore, even if I halved my stakes for E2-E7, I'd still be placing as much financial risk as on 7-22, which makes no sense at all as 7-22 is fully proven and E2-E7 is not.
So, by moving up a step on the ladder of selectivity as far as the Euro systems are concerned, I come to E3-E7. This will filter out more bets that E2-E7 (so in other words is more selective) and the number of bets is much fewer. Thus, half stakes on these mean that the bigger share of my bank in terms of stakes remains on 7-22.
Graeme possibly warned of reservations regarding E3-E7 to some as it may not in itself give enough bets to allow a decent enough spread of the risk. But in the context of MY portfolio as it stands (and that's the whole football portfolio, not just the TFA one) it's fits in very well in terms of the total number of bets I'm looking for.
That's the vital point, Bob. Different TFA systems will suit different people's different needs. What is a strong TFA portfolio of systems for one person could be a poor choice for somebody else.
Cheers,
Rowan