The calm after the storm

From a betting point of view, the transfer window shutting two weeks after the season has kicked off is not desirable for any ante post bets. Teams can change drastically and yesterday was no exception to this, with over £100m being spent on deadline day. Key changes were made to the likes of Fulham, Tottenham, QPR and Manchester City among others, and this has thrown a whole new set of spanners in the works.

In terms of my positions for the new season, not too much has changed. I was very pleased to see that Arsenal didn't do any late deals and I think they are going to struggle a great deal, particularly in the coming weeks. I was a great admirer of Song and I think that not replacing him will come back to bite them, particularly with their injury situations. Cazorla is a superb addition, but a completely different type of player. Their lack of transfer activity has seen them drift out to evens for a top 4 finish, after being 1.7 last week.

In the week, I added Spurs to my list of bets, taking a large position on them to finish in the top 6 at odds of 1.74. I had hoped for bigger signings than they managed yesterday, but with an easy next few weeks, they should do well enough for me to trade out for a profit. In the long run, I can't see Spurs blowing anyone away, their squad is poor and definitely not an improvement on last season. They have only two strikers available up top, and both of those are hit and miss. Competition for fourth spot is going to be tough, but only because each team is now equally poor. Liverpool failed to bring in any big names and after letting Carroll go, and suffering another Lucas injury, I fear they too will fail to flatter.

It looks to me as if Everton have been the biggest winners over the last few weeks, recording 2 emphatic victories as well as signing a wealth of players, something which their failure to do in recent years has been their downfall. I will admit to not knowing a great deal about their new acquisitions, but David Moyes is shrewd and if they are as much of a success as most of his other signings, Everton could look dangerous for fourth place. Currently at odds of 6 if you fancy that.

My only real concern is the dealings at Fulham and what that will do for my top 10 bet. They smashed Norwich on the opening day, and made a real fight for it at Old Trafford, but the losses of Dempsey and particularly Dembele will hit them hard. They secured a real coup in getting Berbatov, and I really think he will do well with them, but it is in the middle of the park where they will be overrun. Murphy left earlier in the summer, meaning that they have now lost their 3 most crucial midfielders from last season. Richardson and Dejagah have also been brought in, but they are both wingers and I feel Martin Jol would have been much better focusing on the heart of their team. I still think that they have a good squad, but I will be keeping a close eye in the next few weeks.

Good luck this weekend.

Frustrationnnnn

I haven't had much time to trade recently and took a few days off from the ASP system. My welcome back, however, was not exactly blissful, with poor game choices resulting in a miserable Sunday (in betting terms at least). I began the day with my biggest ever loss - £38.50 - as City ran riot at White Heart Lane. Such is the nature of this system that this huge loss could have been a small profit, had I reacted slightly quicker and not been greedy, with Dzeko's goal in the 34th minute being an optimum time for a goal to be scored for this system. Had I reacted before his 41st minute goal I could have turned a nice little profit (in fact I have seen others' spreadsheets and they did turn a profit from this game), but I decided to wait until half time to let the AU price recover a bit, meaning more profit. The second goal inevitably came and any profit I had hoped for was gone.

Another factor which I think is letting me down is my game choice. With the return of the Premier League and Sky's unerring coverage of the football I have found myself picking games which I can watch whilst trading, as well as games which I think I know more about. I find myself justifying the games I have selected, which have gone outside of the filters, by saying things such as 'SURELY they can't...' and surprisingly this isn't that effective. My own 'superior' knowledge of the Premier League is highly distorted and biased, for instance yesterday I didn't believe City would score 4 or more goals because I didn't WANT them to score 4 or more goals, and until I can look at games objectively I don't believe I should use matches which go outside of the set filters.

So after such a morale-crushing decomposition of my inabilities, what now? From today I am going to go back to basics for a short while to see how it pans out. I will stick to the set filters and only trade a few games a day, meaning a maximum of two at any one time. I will also reduce my stakes for a short while until I am having a better run of the results. I am still confident that this will come through as the theory is pretty sound and will endeavour to work hard at it to make it right. Today I have a free day so I am going to re-read some of the tutorials and watch the latest videos in order to boost my understanding.

I have also decided to endeavour to find the most profitable and effective systems over the year, so that I can build up a sizeable portfolio to bring me top dollar. This won't begin until the end of September, however, as this is when I return to university and (ironically) have more spare time. 

On the other hand, however, yesterday was a roaring success. Despite being down after City's very impressive performance there was a silver lining for me. The 'Best of the Rest' Market now has City available to lay at 1.44 (backed at 2.26), and the Straight forecast of United/City is at 3.7 (backed at 8.2). I will probably lay the Straight forecast reasonably soon, but leave the other market for a while as I am waiting for odds of around 1.3, and with City's next few games being straightforward ones I think this is easily achievable. I only wish I had had more capital a few weeks ago as I would have A. Lumped much more on City, and B. Backed the Anti-Arsenal markets which I outlined a few weeks ago. In addition to this good news, the United-Arsenal game was a joy to behold and I am still in disbelief. I thought it was amazing when we beat them 6-1, so 8 goals against 'The Arsenal' is unthinkable, full strength side or not. Despite being a huge United fan however, I couldn't help feeling a little sorry for Arsene Wenger in the dugout, and Fergie's post match interviews would appear to suggest he has similar sentiments. Wenger is a decent man, very clever and has an astute knowledge of the game and does certainly not deserve what is happening to him and his club right now, I hope he can recover before he is shown the door. 

I would also just like to say thanks to everyone who has been reading this blog and all of my followers on Twitter. It has now been just over a month that I have been blogging/tweeting my thoughts so to have this many followers and page views so far is very pleasing. Thanks to all, please help to continue spreading the word.

That's all from me today, hope you have a good day.