I'm going to respond to Brulatis comment with a post because I think I might have been misunderstood when I wrote about my approach to trading in my last post.Since I don't think I can explain this in just a few lines,I decided to write a post.Also I want to make it accessible to everyone and I know people tend to not read the comments :P
"You are generally going with the favourite or only when you have the gut
feeling? I like a lot this article of Sultan's blog:
http://centrecourttrading.blogspot.ch/2012/01/valuable-lesson.html
I
think it's the combination between finding value and the gut feeling.
It's true, normally the gut feeling is better on the favourite... The
general problem is that the value often is on the dog. So you have to
selective to pick the real good dogs. "
When I say I work on the favorites market,It doesn't necessarily mean that I fancy the favorite to win or that I spot value on the favorite.I might spot value on the dog and lay the fave.
My insight on the subject is that if you are working to hedge your position,It doesn't really matter if you work on the favorites side or the underdogs side.Its the same thing to lay the fave or back the dog (with some subtleties in between since you can use liability at lower odds for example) .But there are a few reasons why I prefer to work on the faves side.First of all,the liquidity.Since the market has a lot more money flowing on the faves side,its easier to enter or to exit the market.This isn't a big deal for me right now (since I'm working with small stakes) but it can be a problem in the future.Since I don't have the necessary knowledge of the players to always be capable to determine the probability of them winning the game,I always work towards the goal of hedging my position at some point in the match.I don't work to create freebets at the moment.But I have very accurate match reading skills (probably because I'm an extremely competitive person and have played sports since childhood to early adulthood). I'm am more often than not able to spot who is going to break the opponent next within a very small time frame.I can't spot value in the absolute odds the market gives me every time but I'm very good a spotting value in the moving averages in play.I know now for sure that that is my real edge over the market.
Seconds I am much more used to predict the market movements in the faves side.Keep in mind that I'm not claiming to be able to predict the market.Far from it.What I'm trying to say is that I am able to better recognize the moving patterns in that side of the market.I know from past experience that,averagely,a break of serve in situation y makes the market move x ticks in z direction.I am aware that what one side of the moves down,the other as to move up or vice versa.The market is always in balance (at least in two ways markets). But its far more natural for me to look at this from the faves market perspective.
Besides that I tend to be a very active trader on the market.I'm not a scalper but in a well contested match I often make 50+ market movements.Because of this,I have to be very aware of the risk I'm taking.I often prefer to lay the favorite for a smaller responsibility in detriment of backing the dog for a full stake.This allows me to be more focused in the game since I don't have the need to constantly change the stake size.I know I'm limiting my profit by entering the market with less money when value situations arise,but I'm also "reducing" the effects of variance in my bank in a way,since the losses are also smaller.This enables me to be very active on the market while always keeping my focus and not loosing patience.I'm not the kind of trader that is able to sit for 4 hours and not place a single trade.Brulati wrote on his blog a few days ago something about not every low odd represent value.I agree with him at some point.But as I have said before,value can present itself in many different ways.Many times I lay very low odds knowing that they most likely are not value bets and that I'm loosing money in the long run by doing this.But I also know that the mental side effects for me to not enter the market and losing patience can be devastating to my trading.Hence,I'm making more money than I'm losing by simply making sure that I don't deviate from the mental state of mind required for good trading.The price I pay for it is to lose some bets.Think of it as something like changing the oil in your car before it is needed just because it gives you peace of mind to know you wont have to worry about it later.
I think its all for now.Anything anyone wishes to ask me I'm more than happy to respond.But always keep in mind that I'm not a good trader yet,I'm still struggling.Don't look at my words or crazy theories as the undeniable truth,but feel free to use them and mold them into your own way of trading :)
Good greens everyone!
Yes, I understand you wrong. I am also trading at the side where is more liquidity. It's normally where the odd is under 2.00. So I got confused that you were talking about backing the favourite for low odds. Sometimes it's not wrong, because even backing a 1.03 can be value. I wrote some days ago about Valencia vs. FC Basel. I know Swiss football quiet well and so I knew that the odd should be most 1.01 in the situation Basel was.
ResponderEliminarIt's just an example that in my opinion you can't lay every small odd... I think it's necessary to wait until the point the small odd is real value. I know it feels miserable when you miss a lay 1.03 which wins. But in the long term it's better to not get involved when players like S. Williams, Rafa Nadal or Djoker are trading around 1.01. Even if it's value (but gut feeling say no)... you will train to zero in no time and if a trade goes green you will not have the balls to let it run until the end for sure.
My trading style it's a bit different. I try to enter just one time during the match or not even once. It's hart to be that patient, but I learned that really good opportunities are coming during a week. With bigger stake it's enough to have 4-5 big greens (and perhaps ten normal greens) during a month to make a decent profit.