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The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.


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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

Simply like flicking a coin and getting 1.95 odds on either heads or tails.Eventually you will lose.Casino's have demonstrated this for years also.The house always has and edge' date='just like the bookmakers.[/quote'] that`s in theory. you assume that you`re strike rate will be 50% , and in the long term you`ll lose. but.... there are systems and your knowledge , which might help you , and should help you to get 55% strike rate in the long term. now ...make the math again. soccer teams are not just like a coin. the probability is not fully independent event. it has to do with what happen in the past with a small or large measure but it counts. (all i write, on this forum, is just my opinion.)
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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. Well, I agree with kosminus

There are systems, there are handicappers, and I know enough people leaving from sports betting. The biggest mistake of the most bettors from my point of view, that they try to find good selections, not good odds. And those who live from betting should not bet all matches, but select only good matches at good odds, actually. There are many successful handicappers, just check some reliable pick monitoring site like Betsec, there are people who do good in the long run too.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

Can you explain what you mean by this please froment?
For me, betting is only a hobby; here and there I pick some money from that, just to lose them the next day, so it cannot be called source of income at all. So, if I run a strategy, and after some time, strategy turns for a worse and its profit dissapears, I can simply give it up and try another strategy. However, if it's your main source of income, you cannot abandon it just like that, and you cannot afford yourself to try new strategies too often, as you need steady profits, so you have to be carefull with both selection process and staking system. That's like a full time job; you wouldn't switch to another job just like that, without ensuring first that new job will satisfy your needs. Bear in mind that it was my reply to his statement "give up betting if you're not good"; so the point was, you don't have to give up betting if it's only your hobby, nevermind if you're good or bad at it - it's just something you enjoy.
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  • 2 weeks later...

Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. Right,I am already on record on this forum for claiming to be a pro gambler. I wont add to that. I would simply like to say this: There are several things on this thread that are wrong,wrong,wrong!! But I want to pick up on an absolute gem of a quote that was right,right,right. To make money from the bookies you need to be "one step ahead of them". There are 3 ways to achieve this. One of them is very,very hard.YET,curiously enough,its the one that 95% of all gamblers attempt!!!No wonder 99% fail! The other 2 ways are significantly easier....

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. am not sure. I have an inability to keep quiet when I see something that I know to be wrong. Problem is that anything you say on a forum such as this has to be "proven". And Ive already been in trouble on here. So,when I saw this thread,my post was sort of a compromise.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. Well,actually I spose theres no harm in stating one of the 2 easier ways of staying one step ahead. However I should warn you that its really,really obvious and,therefore disappointing. Its also a suject that is frowned on here. I mention it only because the suject is about being a pro gambler,ok? You know the thing that gets me about threads about being a pro gambler is that they ALL seem to think that the hardest part of being a pro gambler......is finding value. IT AINT!!!! It has never been easier to find value....or,rather,it has never been easier to find people who can find value! The easiest way to be a pro gambler is to research the best tipsters and pay them for their expertise....and then BET in large amounts of cash to make a living wage. Thats the hard part-betting in large amounts. The overwhelming majority of punters will never,ever have the courage to do that. And if you cant do that then having value on your side will never make you a pro. Ok,sorry to be disappointing. The other way is a lot better......

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. Actually,if you were desperate to be a pro gambler ie your only or main income comes from gambling,and you were a single man who is prepared to remain single,then I guess you could do the following: Bet on correct scores on betfair for minimal stakes-every week there are some clear value opprtunities, Learn to play low stakes sit and goes on the internet.Anyone of average intelligence can make £60 pw part time without any skill. Subscribe to the 4 most successful sports tipping services and bet whatever you can afford while of course taking care not to risk your bank. Avidly read ALL sports betting forums and follow/bet on those posters who are making a profit betting on outsiders. I dont see any reason why a single man shouldnt be able to make £250 a week from all those together BUT he would still have to have a bank of say £5000 minimum...and probably £10,000. Oh yeah,youd obviously need to move to the North....

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. I would also suggest watching those soccer games where the outsider is at least 4-1 and where betting in running is available. If after 20 minutes the outsider is doing well(without having scored) bet on them!! This is my favourite way to bet soccer...along with watching sky soccer saturday and betting on the outsider if they are doing well.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. I've often thought that one of the things that would stop someone taking their betting more seriously is that you don't actually make that much money on most bets! Whether it is finding value (there's a difference between finding value and finding winners or so I am told) or some sort of trading on betting exchanges. During a football match if you can make £20 on Betfair or whatever then great...but that's £20 for about 2 hours work....most peeps probably earn that anyway.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

I've often thought that one of the things that would stop someone taking their betting more seriously is that you don't actually make that much money on most bets! Whether it is finding value (there's a difference between finding value and finding winners or so I am told) or some sort of trading on betting exchanges. During a football match if you can make £20 on Betfair or whatever then great...but that's £20 for about 2 hours work....most peeps probably earn that anyway.
Hmm,although that does seem logical,the meagre hourly rate does not stop people taking it very,very seriously! I think you gravely underestimate just how much it means to many men to be able to make a profit from betting-especially on football! Why do you think those men who do the sensible thing and simply pay a tipster to do all the hard work are treated with such disdain by most bettors? Its cos to most men making £5 an hour through your own efforts is "better"than making £20 an hour by using a tipster.
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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. Don't get me wrong I agree with what you're saying. It does mean a lot. It's just that I think some people think they are going to make thousands overnight when in fact the profits can be quite small.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

Yes,those bookies will still close or restrict your accounts if you win whether you arb or not.However,if you don't arb,and do win,you will keep a bigger slice of the winnings than if you hedge with the bookies who are 'right' - most of the time - the asian bookies. Pinnacle do offer some of the best odds - and they don't,to my knowledge,close winning accounts.They more or less 'are' the market -having framed their odds early on,they just let the market move them.Given enough volume and 2-way betting,they must win.Stan,James,William Hill and Paddy Power also move their odds in response to betting -but not quite as quickly.So the market can catch them out,but then they restrict winning punters.
even a modest one who whitsdraw monthly say,one hundred bucks or euros?You think he can be listed and more,blacklisted?
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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

even a modest one who whitsdraw monthly say' date='one hundred bucks or euros?You think he can be listed and more,blacklisted?[/quote'] Of course. To take it one step further, I've heard of cases where losing accounts are restricted, just because their betting choices indicate that they might one day become winning (for example, betting only when the price is the highest across bookmakers, betting only on low-overround markets like asian handicap, etc.). It's not possible to honestly (that is, without abusing terms and without fixing matches) make money from most bookmakers. The only way to make money is to bet with Pinnacle or with the exchanges. But winning at the exchanges is very difficult as well, because in the great majority of markets the early prices have no liquidity and by the time the liquidity arrives the market has moved and the value is gone.
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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

I've often thought that one of the things that would stop someone taking their betting more seriously is that you don't actually make that much money on most bets! Whether it is finding value (there's a difference between finding value and finding winners or so I am told) or some sort of trading on betting exchanges. During a football match if you can make £20 on Betfair or whatever then great...but that's £20 for about 2 hours work....most peeps probably earn that anyway.
I completely agree and here is another argument: A good bettor, one that is very knowledgeable and with years of experience can expect to have a ROI of at most 5%. I think anything over that is highly unrealistic. That means that to have an expected income of 100 euros/dollars/pounds in a bet he needs to risk 20 times that, or 2,000. In many betfair markets you can have trouble getting matched on top price at that amount of money, unless it's at very high volume matches (Premiership, Serie A etc.) in which there is probably no value anyway and in which you would probably not want to bet. And that's just to make 100 per match, which is not that big if you think about it; because the "good bettor" in question can only be "good" if he spends a lot of time following at most one or two divisions. Let's say a single division has 35 match days per year, or about 300 matches in total. For two divisions he will have a total of 600 matches per year, adding some cup matches he can expect to have about 700 matches on which he knows enough to be able to bet. Now, to maintain a ROI of 5% it will not be possible to bet on more than 200 of them, because it is extremely unlikely that there will be value on more of them. So in the end, if he risks 2,000 per match, he has an expected profit of 200 times 100 or 20,000 per year. That's not very big (for the amount of time he's spending doing it) and you need to keep in mind that that's only expected profit. In reality it can be much more or much less, and it's very difficult to rely on it for a living. Of course, the above applies to football betting. There are sports that have more events per year (NBA, tennis) so it's possible to make more money, but you would also need to spend more time following them. Those are the reasons why I believe there is nobody (other than bookmakers) who is making a (worthwhile) living from sports betting.
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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

I completely agree and here is another argument: A good bettor, one that is very knowledgeable and with years of experience can expect to have a ROI of at most 5%. I think anything over that is highly unrealistic. That means that to have an expected income of 100 euros/dollars/pounds in a bet he needs to risk 20 times that, or 2,000. In many betfair markets you can have trouble getting matched on top price at that amount of money, unless it's at very high volume matches (Premiership, Serie A etc.) in which there is probably no value anyway and in which you would probably not want to bet. And that's just to make 100 per match, which is not that big if you think about it; because the "good bettor" in question can only be "good" if he spends a lot of time following at most one or two divisions. Let's say a single division has 35 match days per year, or about 300 matches in total. For two divisions he will have a total of 600 matches per year, adding some cup matches he can expect to have about 700 matches on which he knows enough to be able to bet. Now, to maintain a ROI of 5% it will not be possible to bet on more than 200 of them, because it is extremely unlikely that there will be value on more of them. So in the end, if he risks 2,000 per match, he has an expected profit of 200 times 100 or 20,000 per year. That's not very big (for the amount of time he's spending doing it) and you need to keep in mind that that's only expected profit. In reality it can be much more or much less, and it's very difficult to rely on it for a living. Of course, the above applies to football betting. There are sports that have more events per year (NBA, tennis) so it's possible to make more money, but you would also need to spend more time following them. Those are the reasons why I believe there is nobody (other than bookmakers) who is making a (worthwhile) living from sports betting.
Although it might be true what you say, it can also be wrong. This is what you think it can happen with a system, but this doesn't mean you cover all the angles. If you want to generalize you need to use more general terms and situations. Even though you say that you can follow (at maximum 2-3 leagues) I can easily say that it isn't the case. I followed more than 60 leagues during the period of the football matches, and I can say that it isn't that difficult. The hardest part would be to get the wright matches that will play (which is kind of difficult, but you can't miss more than 10 matches - which also could make a difference between losing or winning in the long term). After you have automatized most of the system, you could use less and less time to do everything. The next part which will eat you a lot of time will be looking for odds and get them. But there are sites that can help you with the odds, in the way that they crawl all the odds available the moment they birth, and send them to you instantly. If you watch a movement of the odds, you can see that these move fast, but you have at least 30 minutes or more to make the bet. So after automatizing most of the parts of a system, I think you could run it easily, and with less effort. Using the system to automatically crawl all the info (from the internet or your own database), get the odds of the matches the moment they pop up, using 2-3 bookmakers to place your bets. The next factor I am curios that you point out is the 5% ROI. Even here on this forum you have examples that argue what you said (people having more than 10% on a period >3years). Besides this fact, you could always be on the watch and try new systems on paper, and in the event that your first system shows signs of "drowning" you could change with the new one, or try to adjust the initial system with some new factors you saw would influence it's S/R. The sign of "drowning" could be a result of many factors, besides the fact that team members change constantly (from year to year), coaches, and of course the bookmakers who are always on guard and watch with their odds. The final big step is to find a bookmaker that won't ban you. This is hard, but there are a few. This is more than enough. After all you want to make money. If one accepts your winnings, then that's the one you've been looking for. Even if his market is smaller (eg. Pinnacle), you need to apply to it. I can agree with you on the fact that I, too, haven't seen a "Grand Master Bettor", but maybe we expect to see a sign, that will never come. Anyway, my idea is as follows: even if there are or not "Grand Master Bettors", this doesn't mean you can't be one. After all this is what you are after, if you want to make something out of betting, else you are just trying to prove something to you. As I've always said, you must be one step ahead of the bookmakers. This means your system must always and constantly be cheked, so that you can't be behind the bookmakers.
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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

Although it might be true what you say, it can also be wrong. This is what you think it can happen with a system, but this doesn't mean you cover all the angles. If you want to generalize you need to use more general terms and situations. Even though you say that you can follow (at maximum 2-3 leagues) I can easily say that it isn't the case. I followed more than 60 leagues during the period of the football matches, and I can say that it isn't that difficult. The hardest part would be to get the wright matches that will play (which is kind of difficult, but you can't miss more than 10 matches - which also could make a difference between losing or winning in the long term). After you have automatized most of the system, you could use less and less time to do everything. The next part which will eat you a lot of time will be looking for odds and get them. But there are sites that can help you with the odds, in the way that they crawl all the odds available the moment they birth, and send them to you instantly. If you watch a movement of the odds, you can see that these move fast, but you have at least 30 minutes or more to make the bet. So after automatizing most of the parts of a system, I think you could run it easily, and with less effort. Using the system to automatically crawl all the info (from the internet or your own database), get the odds of the matches the moment they pop up, using 2-3 bookmakers to place your bets. The next factor I am curios that you point out is the 5% ROI. Even here on this forum you have examples that argue what you said (people having more than 10% on a period >3years). Besides this fact, you could always be on the watch and try new systems on paper, and in the event that your first system shows signs of "drowning" you could change with the new one, or try to adjust the initial system with some new factors you saw would influence it's S/R. The sign of "drowning" could be a result of many factors, besides the fact that team members change constantly (from year to year), coaches, and of course the bookmakers who are always on guard and watch with their odds. The final big step is to find a bookmaker that won't ban you. This is hard, but there are a few. This is more than enough. After all you want to make money. If one accepts your winnings, then that's the one you've been looking for. Even if his market is smaller (eg. Pinnacle), you need to apply to it. I can agree with you on the fact that I, too, haven't seen a "Grand Master Bettor", but maybe we expect to see a sign, that will never come. Anyway, my idea is as follows: even if there are or not "Grand Master Bettors", this doesn't mean you can't be one. After all this is what you are after, if you want to make something out of betting, else you are just trying to prove something to you. As I've always said, you must be one step ahead of the bookmakers. This means your system must always and constantly be cheked, so that you can't be behind the bookmakers.
I don't think it's realistic to either follow 60 leagues or expect 10% yield. If there is someone getting a 10% yield then they're probably claiming odds that cannot be actually be gotten or they are just being lucky.
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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

I don't think it's realistic to either follow 60 leagues or expect 10% yield.
Are you telling me what I've done is unrealistic? Or that I haven't done what I've said? I'm telling you that you are looking at the things too limited. There is a limit, but that is set per each person individually. Maybe "follow" in your vision means more than just analyzing the matches. But I did analyze the matches from more than 60 leagues, having more than 18000 matches, from which only a little over 1800 got further for deeper analyze.
If there is someone getting a 10% yield then they're probably claiming odds that cannot be actually be gotten or they are just being lucky.
I think you should first check what you say before saying it. If you'd have "done your homework", you'd have seen that there are people with yield greater than 10% on a period greater than 3 years. I don't think you can call that lucky. Anyway I don't what to enter in a big argue with. You believe what you want to believe, and so do I. But you should first search for information and then comment on it. Good luck in what you want to do in sports betting.
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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. Gambling is the embodiment of evolution in the sense that the successful often are borne out of inheriting methods or discover their own by trial and error. The ones who survive have either inherited good methods or have worked out their own. There are many methods that work and I've survived for 25 years. Nothing lasts forever however and you have constantly got to adapt. Those who can, do. Those who can't, teach others.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. To make a profit from gambling all you need to do is estimate probability better than the bookmakers. However hard this may be, it is clearly possible. To make more than say, the average UK wage, you need to bet extremely large sums of money. To do this you need to be (a) quite rich to begin with and (b) extremely confident in your methods, by which I mean not only your selections but also your staking plan. You also need flawless discipline and patience. I think this last factor is probably the hardest one to come by. I think being a professional gambler has as many disadvantages as it does advantages. They are simply different disadvantages to those in a regular job. Personally my aim is to try and make a good profit, partly as a challenge to myself, as I believe it is fairly difficult to do this- yet possible- therefore making it a good challenge, and partly to have extra money for holidays etc. My ultimate dream is to be able to earn enough to cut down my regular working days to four a week, and use the extra day for betting research. I think it would be too stressful, too anti-social, too much hard work to be reliant on gambling for my entire income. I am in profit overall from betting so far, by what I regard as a decent amount. Having said that, the figure of my profit is no better now than it was five months ago.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

To make a profit from gambling all you need to do is estimate probability better than the bookmakers. However hard this may be' date=' it is clearly possible.[/quote'] I think it's more accurate if we put it this way: To make a profit from sports betting all you need to do is to be more accurate in your predictions than the millions of people who are betting alongside you. Because the people shape the odds, not the bookmakers. If you try to be a smart guy and bet early you will find that bookmakers have very low stake limits on their early odds and they can ban you at the drop of a hat (i.e. when you accumulate a miniscule profit). If you try to play at the exchanges you will struggle to get matched on most of the markets that you could have an edge at and most of the time it will be for peanuts (for example, yesterday's snooker qualifiers had matched bet totals about 2 thousand per match at betfair). That is why I stand by my opinion that there are no long-term professional sports bettors.
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Well, you are so wrong its laughable. I'll happily put you in touch with a longterm pro if you like. You don't need to be more accurate than millions of punters just because "they shape the odds". What a stupid thing to say. You just need to sit on the right side of the fence enough of the time.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

Well' date=' you are so wrong its laughable. I'll happily put you in touch with a longterm pro if you like.[/quote'] Yes, I would like your pro to get in touch with me personally, or even better, with the forum in general. I would have many questions to ask to such a person. But I find it hard to believe that such a person exists and, as I have learnt to put my money where my mouth is, I am willing to bet 500 euros that your friend cannot prove that he's a pro. To prove it he will have to:
  1. Post his selections and stakes.
  2. Satisfy us that he would be able to get the bet on, at the stakes he's going for, at Pinnacle or the exchanges (Pinnacle lists the highest stakes allowed at each event and the exchanges show how much money there is available to be matched). Everyone else would have banned him anyway.
  3. Make at least 20 thousand euros within the next 12 months.

I think those conditions are the bare minimum to persuade us that he really is a pro, although 12 months don't qualify as "longtime". If you want to get this bet on let me know; we'll have to find someone in here of common trust to hold the money for us.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living. Well said Simmo, but I think you shouldn't try to change his mind. He's set on it! Anyway, it does look a bit awkward that I always see he has something to say about this subject, especially when he doesn't even look like he has a clue about what sports betting means and having a system. Anyway, everyone has their opinion, and as we are thought we shouldn't comment what others think, until the point they actually cross the line of reality.

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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

Yes, I would like your pro to get in touch with me personally, or even better, with the forum in general. I would have many questions to ask to such a person. But I find it hard to believe that such a person exists and, as I have learnt to put my money where my mouth is, I am willing to bet 500 euros that your friend cannot prove that he's a pro. To prove it he will have to:
  1. Post his selections and stakes.
  2. Satisfy us that he would be able to get the bet on, at the stakes he's going for, at Pinnacle or the exchanges (Pinnacle lists the highest stakes allowed at each event and the exchanges show how much money there is available to be matched). Everyone else would have banned him anyway.
  3. Make at least 20 thousand euros within the next 12 months.

I think those conditions are the bare minimum to persuade us that he really is a pro, although 12 months don't qualify as "longtime". If you want to get this bet on let me know; we'll have to find someone in here of common trust to hold the money for us.

LOL. This really made me laugh. So actually you are saying that you are willing to pay 500 euros for a system that will bring you 20k in a year??? That's good. Besides this "joke", I don't think it's important the actual money he does, but the ROI that he will have. After all the ROI is everything. If you have a decent ROI you can make more money by betting more money.
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Re: The reality of sports betting/trading for a living.

LOL. This really made me laugh. So actually you are saying that you are willing to pay 500 euros for a system that will bring you 20k in a year??? That's good. Besides this "joke", I don't think it's important the actual money he does, but the ROI that he will have. After all the ROI is everything. If you have a decent ROI you can make more money by betting more money.
Well, Simmo made a claim and he has the burden of proof, don't you think? If you can think of any other way, let us know. I tried to put you guys to the test, I tried to put my money where my mouth is, what else do you want? :-)
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