Your punting goals - Football

[A.M.P]

O.k o.k o.k.

Before some wag replies this doesn't mean telling the boss to fcuk off and retiring to a desert island and starting a harem.

Put simply - what will you consider to be a good week when the football season starts?

I suppose a lot of this will depend on your attitude to risk and the number / types of bets you make. So I will use myself as an example.

My goal is to be in a position to replace my weekly bank with pure profit. My weekly bank will be 30 points. I should imagine this will follow the same pattern as last season - perhaps 5 or six differently weighted singles and the occasional double. I use the doubles when the prices are evens or below and I mentally apportion the same liklihood of success to the both of them.

So, with 30 points staked my idea of a good week is a 5 point return. I know this to some people will be a small return, but I like to diversify my risk and not blow my wad (oooeerr) on one shock result. Allowing for a few bad weeks I aim to double my bank and start playing with the profit in two months. That's the goal anyway!

What's yours?

[Keith]

Don't set goals AMP.

I need to be fearless. A weekly or even monthly target can lead to either being defensive trying to protect your profit or chasing trying to recover losses.

I don't have sleepness nights if I lose even 50pts in a week because I have the self confidence based on past records to know I can just as easily make 70pts the following week.

You can't compare punting like having a steady weekly salary. The only figure I would worry about is after 12 months.

Keep on doing the right thing and the profits will take care of themselves

[zonker84]

I'm the same, you can't really set short-term targets I think. If I make a good profit over a few months I'm pleased.

I'm at the stage now where over a 12-month period I know I'll make a profit. I sometimes have the odd poor month, but nothing you can do about that and just have to get on with it

[A.M.P]

I agree with you to some extent WAS.

I distinctly remember last season I was devastated that I lost 20 points one week. It didn't knock my confidence, I carried on doing what I was doing. The next week I made it back. The week after I was 10 points in profit. If you're good enough in the long term you should be in profit. If I was consistently loosing I'd go away and do something else.

I guess where I'm coming from with this thread is when you look at the final scores what kind of return makes you think "yeah - that was a good week". Please don't think I'm not being ambitious here. Just like that disasterous week I mentioned (and like most punters I can tell you the teams, scores and the reasons why i put on the bet) there have been some exceptional weeks. But that's what I class them as - exceptional.

Last season I had a rough idea if I was up or down. I lived from week to week mentally carrying profits / losses in my head. As a "supposed" student of Accountancy (I got the news today that I passed my bi-yearly exam btw) I should be able to put a more precise figure on this. Even if it's like you say to prepare a rough yearly profit and loss.

So this season I will keep a better "Bet Blog" in excel and probably post my weekly totals in here.

Incidently, I'm waiting on that 2,500 poind pay out from that dodgy internet exchange. Now that would've put me well up for the year as you can imagine....

Will I get it / the deposits back even though?

Cheers for your reply WAS. It's interesting knowing your thoughts on such matters.

AMP

[crowie]

A good weekend = making a profit

A bad weekend = making a loss

I never aim to make a specific amount in any one time period.

But as Was/Zonker have said, its the long term that you want to be look at overall.

I have just been banging on about in another thread but I think its a must to keep a record of every bet. I keep records of the bet, the type (12X/AH/OU or whatever), competitio, stakes and price. I keep my records for a year, normally 1st July to 30th June and at any point in that period I know if I am up/down for the year (to the penny) and also if I am up down in specific bet types or competitions. Having that info to hand can stop money leaking out on specific competition or bet types and also help identify where you do well.

[Swooperman]

For the first time this season I'm going to try & specialise in 1 division & ive chosen English Div 1, simply because apart from Div 2, its got the least number of local teams in so I have as good an unbiased view as I can.....the reason could be used equally totallt the opposite, but thats the reason.
I'll still have the odd bet elsewhere but its something i've doneat cricket for a while & I think I'll try it & I expect it to work tbh....to a degree anyway.
I always bet around 20-25pnts per weekend, & 10-15 per midweek, if I fancy anything, & basically I'll just look to make profit & keep a close record of my bets. I just aim to fund my hobby really without inputting major wages.

[CJ Mars]

So, with 30 points staked my idea of a good week is a 5 point return

I’d be delighted with a consistent return of almost 17% ! Compounded over the course of a year you’d be kicking the stock market’s butt in all bar an absolute golden year.

Short term goals are a bit pointless in my view as well. Its like an army saying well we lost this battle so we’d better give up. It should instead be viewed as a war without end. If you’re punting for a few years you probably have (or should have anyway) a good idea of how you tend to do on average. For example on tennis betting over the last two and a half years I’ve made a yearly average yield of around 7.5% but within that period I’ve also suffered some terrible lows and a few nice highs. For soccer I’d be happy with making a % point or two to be honest over the course of the year.