Week Four

24– 31 August 2010

Well week 4 finished with a profit of £9.05, taking my total profit for the month to £64.87. This was made up of 13 trades of 8 winners and 5 losers. Good news this week with the return of my Internet connection.

I am really disappointed with this weeks profit. It should have and could have been a lot higher. On a more positive note i have learnt a few valuable lessons not only about trading but about myself.

On one trade alone i lost £41.46. Without this trade my profit for the week would have been very nice. I accept that there will be losing trades, they cant all be winners otherwise we'd all be very very rich. The thing that annoyed me about it is, the trade went wrong with 2 very early goals and rather than get out for a small loss of about 30% of my inital stake i chased my loses. My original stakes for the trade was £31 yet i lost a lot more than this. As a trader you should NEVER lose more than your original stake. EVER!! This probably down to my inherent gambling streak that lurks somewhere deep inside me. In the future i must just accept the small loss and move on.

Another thing i found this week was that i was just trading for the sake of it. Sometimes i would just walk straight into the next match that was on with out researching it, without thinking of my exit strategy without thinking of what the best strategies to use actually was. This resulted in losing trades or not maximizing my profit. It was the Santander Vs Barcalona match. It was weighted in a Barcalona getting a good view goals. They dually obliged by taking a 2 goal lead by HT. Yet as I'd rushed in this trade and not actually thought what my next steps would be when certain events happened i only made £3 from it when looking back at it it should have been more like a £20 profit.

The final thing that didn't make for a good week was not checking that all my bets had been matched before going in to play. In one particular trade i had placed an insurance bet on the CS HT market should there be a couple of early goals. I had requested a price which in the end was not matched but i had assumed that it had. As a result there were a couple of early goals which turned my trade from providing a nice £15 return into a trade with a slight loss. Little things like this can make a big difference to your profit and loss so in the future i must make sure everything is in place before that whistle blows.

If the above things mentioned had been eradicated then i would probably looking at a weekly profit of about £80. But this is a journey, I'm still learning this business and as long as learn from these mistakes then it can only benefit future profits.

So lookin ahead to next month, i will only be doing trades that have been well thought out with pre defined exit strategies and targeted profit. I will also make sure all back and lay bets are matched before going into play!!!

STAT CENTRE


(Weekly Profit: £9.05) (Monthly Profit: £64.87) (Season Profit: £64.87)

Week Three

16 – 23 August 2010


WINNER WINNER CHICKEN DINNER!! Well week 2 has come and gone and it’s sent us back into the black. A profit of £68.46 was made this week from 9 trades. 6 winners and 3 losers. Still no internet connection so still muddling through on my iphone. One advantage to the phone trading is I managed to trade the Man Utd match whilst soaking up the sun in a park with my girlfriend and her family but its still far from ideal.


The bulk of this profit was made up from a strategy that I think is going to prove very profitable over the coming season. It uses the unders and overs market and plays one off against the other. I wouldn’t say its risk free but the way its set up allows you to limit your loses very easily should the match not go your way. It was used twice this week and yielded profits of £30 each time. One of these £30 wins was even over by HT which is always nice as it allows you to put your feet up and enjoy the rest of the match.


I’m working on a couple of new strategies at the moment, one is code named “Smash”. I used it twice this week. Its still early days but it yielded 3/3 profitable trades. Albeit they were very small profits but I’m only using small stakes at first whilst I tweak it about a bit. This one isn’t going to make large profits but I think it really has the potential to make VERY regular profits week in week out.



2 out of my 3 losing trades were only very small loses as I manged to limit my loses in play and exit the trades. A Joe Cole penalty miss in the Micky Mouse Europa Cup was the difference between a nice healthy green and a small loss. The 3rd loss of -£7.61 although not massive relative to my stakes slightly annoyed me. My enthusiasm got the better of me. In attempt to maximize profits I tried to apply 2 trading strategies to one match. This is not a very good idea!! The markets were crossing all over the place and it was hard to keep track of my position and figure out what needed laying and what needed backing. I wont be doing that again.


Average profit per trade is now running at £4.29. Lets look to increase this figure next week with some more healthy profits.



STAT CENTRE


(Weekly Profit: £68.46) (Monthly Profit: £55.81) (Season Profit: £55.82)

Week Two

7 -15 August 2010

Well not the best start to my trading diary with an overall loss of £12.64. This was made up of 4 trades. 3 losers and 1 winner.

It’s not the best start however I don’t think it’s the worst start I could have had as I managed to limit my loses quite well which is what this game can be about sometimes.

The situation was not helped by the fact I had no internet connection on my laptop which meant I had to trade from my iphone. This isn’t ideal as its very difficult to get your staking right using the betting app and its also means its very difficult to exit the trade as there is no “what if” function or green up feature that the geeks toy provides. You cant view more than one market at a time either which is essential when you are trying to weigh up your options of what to do next.

I’m fairly happy with the choice of strategies I used and the match selections, but if your basing your trade on goals being scored and it finishes a bore draw then there’s not a lot you can do really.

Hopefully the internet will be back up and running soon as I can crack on and turn this ship around.

STAT CENTRE

Weekly Profit: -£12.64 Monthly Profit: -£12.64 Season Profit: -£12.64

About me and my blog

Well here is my blog. Not sure if anyone will ever read it so you could say its more for me than anyone else. Hopefully posting to this will keep me disciplined and focused and at the same time allow me to keep track of my profit and loss.

This blog will be about my trading journey, about my quest to find the Golden Goose. I know trading is no get rich quick scheme but i do believe a steady profit can be made from this on a regular basis. To do this I'm going to trade the football markets, nothing else. I know about football, well at least i like to think so, so it makes sense to focus on this. I've read so many blogs about the vast riches made on the nags but there not for me. I know horses have 4 legs but that's as far as my knowledge stretches.

I discovered Betfair through matched betting about 2 years ago. Moving into trading felt like the natural progression. I've actually been trading for about 1 year now. I feel like I've come along way since then but know i still have a mountain to climb!!

I will using a host of trading strategies this season, some I've created myself and some I've learnt from various trading sites and litriture. This pointed me in the right direction and opened my mind up pointed me down roads i may never have gone down. My knowledge at the start was limited to laying the draw. Never gone make decent money just doing that all the time.

I'm constantly cooking up new ideas in my head then having a play with them on Betfair. Alot of the time i think i've hit the nail on the head and found the goose only to discover after closer inspection that the stratergie is infact a loser or a straight out gamble. But you cant let this get you down because every now and again you discover something that you can add to your trading arsenal.

So my plan is to update you each week with a breakdown of my profits and maybe a slight insight in to how the week has gone and how i'm progressing overall.