How profitable are the Scottish leagues?

[Mahatma]

I've given up on looking at Serie B, Bundesliga 2, BBVA and French Div 2 as I don't know much about the teams and have difficulty finding reliable team news. I use totalctrl.com for injury news, which covers the 1st divisions in Italy, Germany, Spain and France, aswell as bbc sport for the English leagues. Now I'm not betting on about 40 games a week I feel like I should have a look at more profitable markets such as Scotland while I have the free time. I don't know much about the Scottish league and have only half dozen bets there, only one of which was in division 1 or lower. There is something about what I see to be 22 amateur footballers running around playing football in 60mph winds that dissuades me from betting there. However I'm willing to give it a shot if there is money to be made.

Which slowly brings me to my question. With reliable team news and weather reports, are the Socttish divisions more or less profitable than the Premiership, Serie A, La Liga and Bundesliga? How do they compare with the Championship and below? I assume that a few important injuries and transfers can really cripple teams and anyone that knows this before the bookmakers can get some very nice prices.

[kompressaur]

I assume that a few important injuries and transfers can really cripple teams and anyone that knows this before the bookmakers can get some very nice prices.

Thats for sure Mahatma. Ive been following the Scotish 1-2-3 leagues seriously since i got on the net in 2001. Previous to that i was limited to reading every newspaper i could and just picking things up from reports. I would like to think i showed profit in all them seasons my highlight being picking 12 winners one saturday at evens and above. This season though it has been shocking. Well shocking in Div 3 where everyone has been beating everyone even East Stirling getting in on the act. Montrose bought big and were expected to do well but i think theyve only won 3 games max all season. Berwick lost 5 of their best players to Stenhousemuir and had to draft players in from the junior and east of scotland leagues and Berwick have been sensational and Stenhousemuir more unpredictable than ever.

Division 2 has been not as bad as Div 3 and a few of the trends mixed with team news has made the form work out ok but again its been hard to catch some teams. Division one has been awful for me this season but i've managed to catch some nice priced aways. All in though i really think things are starting to level out a bit and i'm hoping for a good run in from now till the end of the season. I like it when teams have things to play for or not and team news which sometimes can be very iunreliable (check out TDP radio for stations such as Westsound who have an hour talking before the games and go round the grounds for ayr, qos, stranraer and Gretna) these can be pretty invaluable especially if you need to know about key men etc Seems to me that managers even at this level like to play games with their injuries etc It's always the way for me in games i havent listened to the radio about and back against them due to them missing 1 or 2 key players and the key players who are out always pop up on bbc vidiprinter with a goal

The regulars on the scots 1-2-3 thread are never usually far away Mahatma and you'd be a great asset to the thread but sometimes you will be left scratching your head about some results till later when you see what you over looked or missed or how your team should have been 5 up for ht but lost etc. Just like most leagues i suppose.

[Mahatma]

Thanks for the reply Komp, I think you've convinced me to put my energy into the Scottish leagues rather than the main European leagues, which the bookmakers appear to have wrapped up. I've gone through this weekends fixtures and like a few teams, but as you say I've got to wait till Friday to find out who is injured.

[kompressaur]

Aye it wont take you long to pick up the jist of it all mahatma. I'll look out some threads over at pie and bovril where they talk about key players for each team etc to give you a little background to team news etc off the top of my head

alloa - McAnespie, Ovenstone
ayr - stevenson, weaver, campbell, Veraille
Raith - coccary, mcmanus, Andrews
forfar - no one Nah errr i can't think. Ill add to this later hopefully

[kompressaur]

here's some links Mahatma
http://kompressaur.com/wordpress/?page_id=362

[_d_]

Plenty of good reading material here

http://www.puntersindex.com/football/europe/scotland/

Local papers & club sites are good for the lower league match reports which are pretty much 3 liners in the nationals. Most offer post match comment from local heroes and big match build up as the weekend approaches. Mixed in with some up to the minute info & delusion from the fans forums and you're off and running.

While doing that you can listen to worldwide, incredible exclusives from the top team at radio scotland every night from 7. Mainly an ess pee ell focus here but it can be handy listening if you fancy including the top flight, and of course there's always the very occasional bone thrown to the lower league scavengers.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/sports...nd/index.shtml

[Mahatma]

great links _d_, thanks.