Football World Cup 2014

[ileks]

It's complicated.

Certain strategies we (my syndicate partner and I) run are very low risk, very high volume. Others are pure position taking where we do some research and then decide the market has it wrong and then punt on our opinion. The former is a low margin cash cow, but the latter is where the real money is. If you can tolerate the losing streaks, then the overall margin can be very high. Our low risk stuff is of the order of 1% margin, the high risk would be minimum 10%.

Stop if we lose £x? Well, we manage our bankroll such that we adjust staking according to how much we currently have in total. Eg: lets say I have a bank of £100 and I want to bet on brazil and I think I have an edge of 15%, I can use a formula called the kelly staking criteria to work out how much of that £100 to bet on that one bet. It optimises bank growth over time and factors in both winning and losing variance. The real problem is that the 15% figure is an estimate, and may be wildly wrong. Ultimately, yes, there is a point at which I'd stop, but it's not defined in stone. shrug.

Oh, and for that brazil bet, you'd not bet more than 5% of your bankroll, tops.

You have such a cool job.

If you don't mind me asking, what information are you using to form your probabilities in a world cup? I mean, surely there isn't much to go on given the top teams rarely ever meet eachother, or if they do it's usually in friendlies which don't reflect a WC game at all. Do you use some kind of ranking system or do you model goals as a poisson process and use some clever technique to infer the parameters (attacking/defending "strength" etc.) from previous games?

 

[ileks]

My only bets so far have been the Paddypower 100/1 special on England (£10), plus the extra £5 free bet they gave me. I put that on Neymar to score first. I thought I'd lost it but own goals don't seem to count. Result. Now I've got £15 to lose.

 

[Moriath]

I assume you're referring to the Brazil Croatia game? Yeah, that was a bit of a nightmare. Win's a win.

I mean having that much money to gamble with hehe

 

[Raven]

My only bets so far have been the Paddypower 100/1 special on England (£10), plus the extra £5 free bet they gave me. I put that on Neymar to score first. I thought I'd lost it but own goals don't seem to count. Result. Now I've got £15 to lose.

Most (if not all) dont count an own goal as the first goal. I won £220 last season on a £1 bet on a Chelsea game and didn't realise I had won until I went to put some more bets on a week later.

 

[Chilly]

You have such a cool job.

If you don't mind me asking, what information are you using to form your probabilities in a world cup? I mean, surely there isn't much to go on given the top teams rarely ever meet eachother, or if they do it's usually in friendlies which don't reflect a WC game at all. Do you use some kind of ranking system or do you model goals as a poisson process and use some clever technique to infer the parameters (attacking/defending "strength" etc.) from previous games?

No chance, sorry That is the source of our success. Knowing what data is useful and how to treat it to get useful information out to trade on. You're right, though, tournament markets like this are notoriously difficult to model, hence why the opportunities (if you can spot them) are so much bigger than something like, say, the premiere league.

Oh, and goals are not a pure poisson. You will rapidly lose money if you don't know the right tricks to make it fit.

 

[Chilly]

I mean having that much money to gamble with hehe

We started with £800 two years ago. It's a job like any other. Apply skill and effort (and some luck) and you get reward.

 

[megadave]

We started with £800 two years ago. It's a job like any other. Apply skill and effort (and some luck) and you get reward.

What are you up to now ?

 

[Gwadien]

What are you up to now ?

£801.

 

[ileks]

No chance, sorry That is the source of our success. Knowing what data is useful and how to treat it to get useful information out to trade on. You're right, though, tournament markets like this are notoriously difficult to model, hence why the opportunities (if you can spot them) are so much bigger than something like, say, the premiere league.

Oh, and goals are not a pure poisson. You will rapidly lose money if you don't know the right tricks to make it fit.

Haha fair enough!

The papers I've seen adjusted it slightly to account for low scoring games (1-0, 0-0 etc). I couldn't follow it as soon as it got on to all the Markov Monte Carlo stuff though.

 

[Olgaline]

The stratergy seems simple tbh, well at least in this case.
He bets on the "sure bet", but increase the volume of the bet to make it worth the trouble.

 

[ileks]

The stratergy seems simple tbh, well at least in this case.
He bets on the "sure bet", but increase the volume of the bet to make it worth the trouble.

It's not that simple at all! Given the edge that you think you have (the hard bit), you calculate the proportion of your funds to bet on each event so that your money tends to infinity with time, not to zero. It's a method used in finance, gambling etc. It's possible to have a massive edge but still go bust because you're betting too much of your available funds.

 

[Olgaline]

It's not that simple at all!

Looking at his bets so far, isolated, at least so far, then yes,it boils down to that.

more often thatn not KISS will prevail and conquer

 

[ileks]

Looking at his bets, that he has told us about anyway, yes that's preaty much it tbh.
I' sure he and his partner have made pleanty of systems and calculations, but looking at each bet
isolated, at least so far, it boils down to that.

He's backing England against Italy. Definitely not a safe bet might be good value though.

 

[Raven]

Like I said before 1 all

It will also be a boring game because of the heat and shit pitch.

 

[Olgaline]

He's backing England against Italy. Definitely not a safe bet might be good value though.

I'm guessing he's English though yes? heart goes in brain goes out An isolated bet against better judgement etc....However!
Taking the pitch that they will be playing on into concideration, I'm not so sure it's such a bad bet tbh.

 

[megadave]

Two really bad off-sides against Mexico

 

[Shagrat]

And Cameroon are bloody awful. Mexico should be 2-0 up, no wonder their manager is having kittens on the sideline

 

[Lethul]

and just when you thought all those ghetto country refs had a bad start

 

[Raven]

Didn't catch the first half as just got in. Watching the half time drivle.

Seriously, they need to ditch all this shit with having refs from piss pot leagues, have 2 or 3 from each of the top leagues.

 

[ileks]

Found a semi decent stream. Go to wiziwig.tv and look for streams by "BloodzeedTV". You need a program called Acestream but the quality is the best I've found. Used it for premiereship games last season and it was quite reliable then as well.

edit- tit's ridiculous that this is much much better quality than ITVplayer, iplayer and the virgin online TV thing combined.

 

[Raven]

Was watching the ITV HD channel on TV while eating my dinner. Had to check we hadn't got in on the normal channel.

 

[megadave]

Found a semi decent stream. Go to wiziwig.tv and look for streams by "BloodzeedTV". You need a program called Acestream but the quality is the best I've found. Used it for premiereship games last season and it was quite reliable then as well.

edit- tit's ridiculous that this is much much better quality than ITVplayer, iplayer and the virgin online TV thing combined.

where do you live? don't you have a tv?

 

[Raven]

Meh, I don't watch stuff on the TV if I can help it...even if I did I would rather watch a stream than ITV.

My PC area is custom me.

 

[CorNokZ]

Git a betting pot going with a couple of my mates. So far I've been spot on with 3-1 and 1-0. I've predicted Spain to win this 2-1. Get on it @Chilly

 

[Raven]

Iniesta looks more like a peadophile by the game.

 

[Raven]

I really hope biscuits breaks both legs at some point too.

 

[Calaen]

Mark Lawrenson commentary hes been trying to crack one liners all night. What a fucking dickhead.

 

[Calaen]

Never a pen either fs

 

[soze]

That's another dive isn't it? I don't think he caught his trailing leg.

 

[old.user4556]

I've just watched it five times on Sky+, total dive