90 Day Football Trading Challenge

[Alexander_99]

This might seem like a rip-off this thread: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=22665, but in truth I wanted to do something similar in spirit for a while. I trade football daily, or almost daily, so the idea is to document my daily profit / loss as a % of my bank. I am not setting any particular stupid challenges for myself like "make X profit per day", though.

I am trading / betting inplay on match odds and over / under goal markets only, when I am watching the live match. I am not using any "historical" stats as such, rather simply attempting to read the flow of the game and decide if it's worth it to get involved. However, I do know and follow the recent performances of teams, which does help me make a decision.

A part of the reason for doing this is that although I am making a profit, I do have discipline issues. Namely, that I tend to lapse into betting or scalping on "unders" market, quite often when the match is unsuitable for doing so, in an attempt to make some "easy" money - which proved very costly, time and time again. So the aim for the next 90 days would be to either abstain from, or at least minimise, backing "unders" market, and concentrate mainly on match odds and backing overs.

I typically stake anything between 1% and 10% of my bank per trade, and I tend to enter multiple markets on certain games - hence in one such match, I could be risking up to around 12% of my bank at once. My betting approach has a huge variance - on some days, my bank increases by 100-200%, only then to encounter large losses and barely break even. So let's wait and see.

This thread is also for anyone who also wants to share their daily achievements (or failures).

[Derek27]

I'm usually flexible with my staking but for football, as I'm relatively new to the game and a goal can turn your position upsidedown, I strictly limit myself to a fixed maximum liability that I decide on before the match. The Soccer Mystic scenario tool comes in handy for that and I keep it visible for most of the match.

Increasing your bank by 100-200% in one day sounds great but it's hard to imagine doing that without over-staking, and as you point out it can result in heavy losses. Good luck.

[Alexander_99]

I'm usually flexible with my staking but for football, as I'm relatively new to the game and a goal can turn your position upsidedown, I strictly limit myself to a fixed maximum liability that I decide on before the match. The Soccer Mystic scenario tool comes in handy for that and I keep it visible for most of the match.

Increasing your bank by 100-200% in one day sounds great but it's hard to imagine doing that without over-staking, and as you point out it can result in heavy losses. Good luck.

Out of interest, what is your fixed max liability (as % of your bank)?

[Derek27]

I'm usually flexible with my staking but for football, as I'm relatively new to the game and a goal can turn your position upsidedown, I strictly limit myself to a fixed maximum liability that I decide on before the match. The Soccer Mystic scenario tool comes in handy for that and I keep it visible for most of the match.

Increasing your bank by 100-200% in one day sounds great but it's hard to imagine doing that without over-staking, and as you point out it can result in heavy losses. Good luck.

Out of interest, what is your fixed max liability (as % of your bank)?

It's not a percentage of my bank. I started off limiting my liability to £10. I soon put it up to £50. The main reason for this is that I'm used to winning nearly every day on the horses (not necessarily a lot) but thought soccer could be more up and down, so a fixed maximum risk would be a better guide as to whether I'd be profitable with football. I've found football isn't as risky as I thought, losses can be limited if you look ahead to the prices after the next goal, never had more than two maximum losses in a row (they're not really maximums because they're offset by whatever green I had), so I'm thinking when I get more serious, somewhere in the region of 5% of my committed bank would be about right for me. But bear in mind the best % stake is strategy dependent - the higher you're strike rate the bigger % you can use.

[Alexander_99]

I'm usually flexible with my staking but for football, as I'm relatively new to the game and a goal can turn your position upsidedown, I strictly limit myself to a fixed maximum liability that I decide on before the match. The Soccer Mystic scenario tool comes in handy for that and I keep it visible for most of the match.

Increasing your bank by 100-200% in one day sounds great but it's hard to imagine doing that without over-staking, and as you point out it can result in heavy losses. Good luck.

Out of interest, what is your fixed max liability (as % of your bank)?

It's not a percentage of my bank. I started off limiting my liability to £10. I soon put it up to £50. The main reason for this is that I'm used to winning nearly every day on the horses (not necessarily a lot) but thought soccer could be more up and down, so a fixed maximum risk would be a better guide as to whether I'd be profitable with football. I've found football isn't as risky as I thought, losses can be limited if you look ahead to the prices after the next goal, never had more than two maximum losses in a row (they're not really maximums because they're offset by whatever green I had), so I'm thinking when I get more serious, somewhere in the region of 5% of my committed bank would be about right for me. But bear in mind the best % stake is strategy dependent - the higher you're strike rate the bigger % you can use.

I assume you are mainly scalping the correct score / unders / the draw?

[Alexander_99]

Done for the day, after a ten hour marathon session.

Had a difficult afternoon. At one time my bank was over 20% down, including a single match that took 11% from me.

All worked out nicely in the end. Finished the day with 18% bank growth.

[Trader724]

Done for the day, after a ten hour marathon session.

Had a difficult afternoon. At one time my bank was over 20% down, including a single match that took 11% from me.

All worked out nicely in the end. Finished the day with 18% bank growth.

How often do you have a 20% drawdown?

[Alexander_99]

Done for the day, after a ten hour marathon session.

Had a difficult afternoon. At one time my bank was over 20% down, including a single match that took 11% from me.

All worked out nicely in the end. Finished the day with 18% bank growth.

How often do you have a 20% drawdown?

Quite frequently...my betting / trading style is very volatile. One particular bad drawdown was several weeks ago which took over 30% from me. I should point out that a reason for this is because a substantial part of my "trades" are actually rather straight bets, without intention to close my position; hence I guess it is natural to encounter bad losing runs.

[Trader724]

Done for the day, after a ten hour marathon session.

Had a difficult afternoon. At one time my bank was over 20% down, including a single match that took 11% from me.

All worked out nicely in the end. Finished the day with 18% bank growth.

How often do you have a 20% drawdown?

Quite frequently...my betting / trading style is very volatile. One particular bad drawdown was several weeks ago which took over 30% from me. I should point out that a reason for this is because a substantial part of my "trades" are actually rather straight bets, without intention to close my position; hence I guess it is natural to encounter bad losing runs.

This kind of challenge is suitable for those who want to gamble and obviously the luckiest will make the most profit but it's not the most effective way to take advantage of the edge you have and I personally think the healthiest is to try to move away from the tendency to gamble when you know for sure that you will make a long-term profit through trading that ensures both financial and psychological stability especially if we talk about large banks.

[kascello]

I Have had a similar experience with staking on the same markets and I'm now instead trying to automate most of my goals trades and look for incentive and good odds for doing match odds manually. I think 1% loss of bank is the way to go as a maximum until you have kept your own data judging on how profitable a strategy is, and selection is key. Why make a long term investment in something you aren't sure is profitable , or how often you need to win to turn a profit consistently.