Subjectivity Nil

See what happens when I let subjectivity get in the way of my Cassini formula? Total carnage. Chelsea -1 wasn't even close. We had a few XX Draws yesterday too, Classics had one winner from four, and three winning unders, while the Extended selections were poor - no winning draws from three and only one under. Not the best of days.

One subscriber suggested the Full-Time 0-0 or Half-Time 0-0 might be profitable, and while I don't have the Half-Time scores (something to add next season perhaps), I do know that 0-0 has been the final score in 9.25% of selections, which works out at a price of 10.81. Exclude the Bundesliga, and the numbers get even better, 10.3% (9.72).

The longest run of games between winners is 37, which wouldn't be for everyone, but then you get spells like early February where there are five 0-0s in eight selections.

For the Extended selections, the number of 0-0s is 80 from 804 (9.95%, 10.05) - exclude the Germans again, and we have 72 from 680 (10.59%, 9.44).

Plenty of ideas to look at during the close season.

JP is back. After two years, and a day, since his last post, he has returned with an update on his betting life. Some of you may remember his strategy - to sign up for several services and make money. After a great start, things went downhill in 2010, unfortunately after JP had given up his part-time job. As JP writes, it took him six months to find a job, and:

"Whilst my former job didn’t exactly raise my spirits, it paid the bills and gave me something to do other than spend all day putting bets on and then watching how they got on, which wasn’t too well at that time".

The key for me is that if the bills are paid, your betting will be a lot less stressful, and it is much easier to make the correct decision. The temptation to cut winning trades short is strong, and is only stronger when you can lock in the mortgage payment for the month, but the decision to trade out should be based solely on whether it is value to do so, not because there's a bill to pay.

Something else that JP wrote caught my eye, which was:

Overall my profit over the lifetime of the blog was around £57,000 – very nice but that doesn’t include the subscriptions I paid during that time, which totalled £20,273 believe it or not.

So a net profit of £37,000 in 31 months, which is a more modest £1200 a month – but still a very good return considering how badly things went in the last few months.

£57,000 sounds great, and I'm not knocking it, but when you factor in expenses, which for JP were likely much more than they are for most of us, and divide the winnings by time, the figure becomes a little less exciting. 

When the Super Premium Charge was announced, lots of people took the attitude that someone having made £250,000 had made a fortune, but for anyone signing up in June 2000, that sum over ten years is less than £500 a week.

Anyway, welcome back JP, his blog was always far more interesting that the typical P&L blog.