Greening-up - does it really pay long-term?

It depends on the odds in and out. If they are both at " good value" you will come out ahead.
If not then you won't.

I think I'm gonna have a nice glass of rose. Sit in the middle that's me.

good lad FAFH

for example i have just greened up federer/nadal. if nadal wins i will have passed away 70 quid. but federer would have cost me 100+ pre greening

As it happens, paulme, I backed Nadal at 2.06 with £100 pre-tournament, so I can now lay him and guarantee myself approx £40 on either Rafa or Fed.

I intend to let it ride on this occasion, especially after today's experience.

hmm same situation as me. just greened the fed half hour ago. he's playing really well, still want nadal to win. left more green on him

Plechy the question you have to ask yourself if you hadnt back Nadal already is would you put £140 on him now at 1.45 or 1.44?

If the answer is now then the best thing to do is hedge the bet back.

That example holds in all situations when the bets are all on Betfair and is one reason to have your initial bet here as opposed to having it at the same price with a bookmaker.

you can tell i'm tired by the simple spelling mistakes

never bet when kanackered which is advice I followed myself today as I was felt just too tired to bet on the Britains Got Talent final today when I had been betting on the show all week.  Previous post shows I was right.

The biggest error new traders make is to close out winning trades too soon and let losing trades run. FAFH hits it on on the head when he says it all depends on the price you can green out at. If it is value to lay off, then it makes sense, if it is not value, then you are giving away money. Simply put, you should green up only if it is value to do so.

Don't make a habit of it. Trust your instincts when you've got an uneasy feeling while holding a winning position. Green out opportunities call out to you, not the other way around.

Yes

the real benefit from greening up is emotional not monetary

I almost never green up.

As CLYDEBANK29 says you need to ignore the first bet and decide whether you would place the second bet if the first bet didn't exist.

If the weight of the first bet is influencing your decision then I would suggest that your initial bets are probably too high vs your bank/risk appetite.

Ask yourself this - with the 3 bets you mention above did you at any point consider putting even more on as the event progressed? If not then I would suggest that your initial stakes are too high as you were clearly looking to get out of the positions rather than looking for value which could result in you increasing your exposure.

Bet according to what's going on out on the pitch/court/track, never according to the colour of your screen.

(Unless, of course, you somehow stand to win a life-changing sum, when hedging becomes almost obligatory.)

I'd agree with curlywurly, your success as a gambler/trader depends more on how you handle the losing bets rather than the winning ones. If you can handle those losing bets/runs then realistically the only time to close out is when your consider the closing bet to be value.

But a lot really depends on how you're gambling, most traders will simply green up cos they haven't a clue about the value they hold and won't have put too much effort into the original bet, if you're picking what you consider to be value bets then the only time to consider jumping ship would be when you no longer consider the odds on offer to be value

Appreciate all comments, cheers.

Rightly or wrongly though, the size of your bank will inevitably effect your decision-making. I mean, if you have £30,000 or £3,000 behind you, you are obviously much more likely to let a bet of £300 ride, regardless of the evidence of your eyes or gut feelings, because the damage if you lose will be relatively minimal. So in that sense, the bit about treating a £3 bet the same as a £300 one, with the same care and consideration and thoughts of whether to green-up or not, doesn't ring true. That's human nature. Having a bigger pot tends to make you braver and more cavalier, which can be as rewarding as much as damaging provided you are careful in your selections in the first place.

Also, you surely must be flexible in your thinking. For example, when I placed the £320 on England to score 450 1st inns runs, it was in the belief that two of 4 batsmen (Strauss, Cook, Trott and Bell) would score at least 100 each, and that the other two would contribute 50 apiece. I reckoned on the other 6 scoring the other 150 between them.

But when Strauss (4 runs), Trott (2) and then Pietersen (2) left England 22-3, I clearly needed to re-evaluate the original bet and decide whether I could trust the other 7 to score 450 between them. We all now know that they did achieve it, but that doesn't mean my initial instincts were correct. My bet didn't go anything like according to plan. Yes, they did eventually go past 450, but did so with a lot of luck (Prior and Broad were playing Russian roulette) and an unlikely contribution of 40+ from the two fast bowlers. On another day, Prior could have lost his wicket five times in the opening two overs of yesterday's morning session alone.

The £320 I stood to lose on this bet represented half of my bank, hence my cautionary reaction to the fall of so many cheap early wickets. Overstaking? Possibly. But my original hunch proved correct, albeit in a much different way to how any of us could have envisaged.

At the end of the day, surely every bet we place is really a vision we have of how we EXPECT a certain event to unfold. And when that doesn't happen, we have to readjust our sights and thought processes.

And I have now decided to green-up in the tennis final at RG so that I collect £40 regardless of whether Rafa or Fed win.

Thank you for your interesting comments, and please keep 'em coming...

In the Montenegro game, I decided to green up because Bulgaria had scored the 2nd goal in the 68th min, to make it 1-1, and (without the help of live pics) took the decision to assume that momentum was more likely to see them win the game than the home side.

When a reasonable sum becomes 0 due to e.g. an injury time equaliser or dodgey pen and red or horse falls and you could've layed off for relative pennies, well that's just not clever is it, regarldess of any quibbling about the relative value of the pennies to someone not involved at that point.

the pennies given away greening up might eventually add up to an overall loss at the end of the year, when you might otherwise, by keeping the full green on the winners and accepting the last minute losses , have finished the year in profit.

I'm tempted to start keeping an analysis of this greening-up process but, on yesterday's evidence, it might prove too depressing!

whatever you do whether it be greening up or letting it run you should do the same all the time

if you have the mentality to see out the losses without losing the head then always let your bets run

if your more of a safety man then always green up

in saying that i always let me bets run these days

just bet a horse at killbegan, was a close photo, bottled it and greened up so probably best not listening to me [smiley:crazy]

You might as well ask "Betting. Does it really pay long-term?"

If you do it right, yes. If not, no.

Lori - you make it all sound so simplistically easy without appearing to have given any serious thought to your reply. So what is your response to the actual origial question?

Lori is right and the reason has already been given.

If you do it because you like a nice green screen and the appearance of safety that goes with it but you always take the price on offer then you're probably slowly but surely giving away a chunk of your profit.

If you do it because it's poor value for whoever matches your bet then it's a good method of turning your funds over without having to risk more of your bank.

Surely you should know what yu doing before yu enter any market...are yu an outright layer, scalper, swing trader, whatever...its your method of operation, something that suits your temprement/character....over time it should become written in stone so yu don't have to think or question...certainly not over the issue of a handful of bets/trades.

Work it out by looking back at your own record at strategic points....it will mean far more than anybody elses experience.

If you really put half your betting bank on one bet then you are not going to be around long enough to work out whether greening up is good long-term

I've posted enough times on Kelly Staking and value betting to know that it's not going to change any opinions.

Work out what you think the odds should be, work out if you're currently above a sensible Kelly number, work out how much you're actually staking by laying off (you can often take *slight* bad value because of things like commission or you can drift into overstaking because you no longer have a big enough edge to justify your current stake, so your expected growth can reduce)

Stuff like that. Stuff that's been posted a lot before that you could google if you want. A search of Lori and Kelly within this forum on google would probably give you enough arguments to last you a few months.

The original question is very time consuming as i'd have to re-create the conditions in the events in question, price them up and factor in your bet sizing and bankroll to give you an honest and correct answer.

It's nothing to do with daring, dashing-do or bravery, it's all maths.

The short answer is that given the markets on Betfair are reasonably efficient and given that greening-up bets are commission free, then if you want a rule of thumb, you're probably not hurting yourself by greening up.

At the end of the day though, my first response was probably better.

Lori is right on both counts, but for me what counts is how good you are at handling variance, esp. at handling what seem undeserved losses and bad runs.

I am very bad and tend to green up just under the expected return to reduce any liability.

The other two issues are the size of bank you can deploy (if you can deploy a lot of yr trading bank at odds wh/ make it worth yr while to bet, you shd green up to preserve and grow yr bank).

The other issue is minimising your comm., which is best done by greening up, since we are charged by market rather than by transaction. Incidentally this feature is at the bottom of a lot of bf's current woes, as it seems to have reached market saturation in its home area.

If you are confident in your ability to price up an event, then about the one opportunity Betfair offers which is an improvement on the world pre-Betfair is that of being able to accommodate punters desperate to green up in a market with little money about.

True. Hence the bots that enter markets just after kick off with large sums 10 or 15 ticks above market price.

Unappealing to everybody other than the price insensitive "trader" desperate to have a nice looking green screen.

I made a record of about 30 bets, these were mostly bets in long term markets.

I nearly always got matched on the winners but seemed more often than not to be left unmatched on those bets which were unsuccessfull.

A not very scientific a sample I know but my results seemed to conclude pretty convincingly that greening up was a dubious aid to profitibility.

imo a half decent rule of thumb for greening up is:

don't cross the spread and you'll probably be all right in the long run.

Thanks to all for your responses.

So glad I greened up before the start of the French Open tennis today...

Had all green £100 on Rafa and £0 on Fed!

Oh well, it's a learning curve.

i also lost money by greening up on rafa but hey ho better than losing money

*you know what i mean

the real benefit from greening up is emotional not monetary

Correct, as is Lori.

I should start a thread entitled,

How the Premium Charge taught me to love losing.

But the mods like to delete my stuff.

You can minimise the commission paid by greening up, but any commisssion saved is offset by a corresponding increase in your PC paid!

Hello there Plechy

Deciding whether to green up (when an event is in-play) depends on the nature of the bet within the market that you are betting on. For example in a football game if you take the outright market you can place a bet on the draw without the intention of betting that the game is actually going to finish as a draw.

Using this example if a game is 0-0 after 25 minutes and you feel that there wont be a goal in the next 5 minutes but also that you think the price will fall significantly in the next 5 minutes then you could back the draw with the expressed intention of then laying the draw in 5 minutes time and greening up.

You have no idea of whether you think that the price in question is a good value price for the draw at placing the back bet. In this instance you are not betting on the game being a draw just simply that there wont be a goal in the next 5 minutes and that the change in odds that you expect means that the value of that bet will be good.

If the odds in and the odds out are not both good value then that sort of strategy will also fail long term.
If not, why not ?

The chances are that both bets will be good value. The flats and plunges on the price graphs tell the story of where to back and lay (after the event) the trick is getting used to doing it just before it happens obviously.

???? Trevh.

Look at you P&L for backs and lays. If all lays only or backs only show a loss then forget greening up.

Can't argue with that really. Irrefutable logic.

Curly nailed it ....saves a lot of anguish by greening up if things get too heavy .


After saying that, since the pc charge i tend to let things run a bit more than i used to.

Coach
Things only get too heavy if you're in too deep.
And if you're in too deep then it's only a matter of time before it all goes pear shaped, regularly greening up or not.

FAFH , sometimes the unexpected happens ,that's the only time  i green up in bulk ..and possibly out of value ... but after saying that you are probably right about the 'being in deep' lark ,i have half a mind to bet in lower volumes for the new season ,too many close shaves for my liking.

Sounds wise Coach.
I'm sure your doctor will see improved blood pressure readings.

It pays in the sense of your pschology.
As for me and many other punters that is the greatest hurdle to overcome then giving away some value for a guaranteed win even if you're giving some value away, is more profitable in the longterm.

Apologies. Not giving away value twice, obviously.

Just a badly constructed sentence.

FAFH - A stiff drink helps with the nerves  i find  [;)]

Hello there Fine as frog hair, glad to see that you are losing your battle with forum addiction. I had visions of you going into Forum Anonymous meetings and saying things like "my name is Fine as Frog Hair and its been 5 days since i last posted". Only joking of course.

Anyway with regards to you post saying "If the odds in and the odds out are not both good value then that sort of strategy will also fail long term." i'd have to disagree and say that as long as your cumulative odds are above value then your srategy will be successful.

Taking an extreme example along the lines of draw in outright matches as referred to before, if the true value in-play is 3.00 and you back it at 3.50 and then the true value drops to 2.90 after 5 further minutes and you lay it at 3.00 overall this strategy will be sucessful long-term even though the lay bet isn't at value.

All you are doing is betting that in those 5 minutes there wont be a goal and the true value of this bet is difference between 3.00 and 2.90 whereas you got the bet on at the difference between 3.5 and 3.00 which is obviously greater and therefore value.

I know that you may well say that if you left it a bit further before laying then that would be better and you would be right but the purpose of the example is to illustrate that not every single bet has to be a value bet in order to succeed long term.

Hello there UA.
Unfortunately I have to disagree with you.
You are assuming that you are more right than wrong in your " guessing" that there is not going to be a goal in the next 5 minutes. The movemennt of the odds in that 5 minutes will fairly reflect the probaility involved.
If you open and close always on the wrong side of the spread ( that is at poor value), you will lose long term, unless you have a very good crystal ball.
Btw not a bad idea that one for Forum Anonymous.

'It pays in the sense of your pschology.'

This, I probably give up 20% of my profit greening up but i'm far happier and more comfortable that way.  Much prefer to have 2 small winning weeks than 1 small losing and 1 big winning week.

Hello there FAFH

You say "If you open and close always on the wrong side of the spread" but i am not saying open AND close just that either the open or the close could still theoretically not be at value and it still be a value bet.

You also use the term "guessing" but lets face it determining what the absolute true value is at a point in the game is by and large "guessing" as well. It's like saying that you are right more than
you are wrong when guessing what the true value of a market is.

You also say that the movement in odds will reflect the probability involved but i disagree as you're implying that everyone who has an opinion on what the price should be, will be correct. There are always going to be inaccuracies. It's like saying that the price of a game just before kick-off is always the true price as that's what people think it should be.

UA
Your points are fair enough.
But in the long term the odds quoted are essentially pretty close to spot on in terms of probability.
So if you trade in and out consistently just taking the bet and lay odds on offer, you will lose overall eventually.
That's all I'm saying essentially.
DonNo1
Not very professional, but completely understandable.
Each to his own.

No worries FAFH.
Have you started doing any live trading yet or do you still avoid it.
By the way I notice your posts are coming thick and fast tonight.

No I don't trade at all UA.
Too time consuming in the sense that when I did  it took up too much of my leisure time.
I position trade only well before the off, and only on football.
Place my bets, close down my computer, go out and have fun and relax, come back much later and check the results after all is done and dusted.
Much more rewarding both stress wise and actually monetary wise.

'Not very professional'

It's not ideal but i'm content with how much I make and much prefer finishing the day in a positive mood

Yes it does make that evening sherbert much more enjoyable I agree.

Fun betting isn't that what the bookies are always trying to get us to imbrace Don1?

But is there really much fun in losing?

If you bet in a way in which you acknowledge as less profitable, namely greening up, the game in the long run will be less lucrative.

I believe you make more money in the long run if you're a good place psychologically.
Big swings, though on paper, might lead to larger profits, but we are driven by emotions and in reality unless you're psychologically incredibly strong then the dips are likely to lead to you making bad decisions.

Slow and steady profits mean you tend to be in a much better psychological place, feel less pressure and are therefore less prone to errors and make better decisions.
Leading I suspect to more profit in the long run.

'If you bet in a way in which you acknowledge as less profitable, namely greening up, the game in the long run will be less lucrative.'

Naturally. I don't have the ideal make-up for a gambler and am rather risk averse but i've managed to form an edge such that I can make it pay well whilst taking on low levels of risk.  I quantify losses and feel regret often so I like to lock in profit when I can even if i'm laying slightly above the true price.  If I was at the limit of making a living on here I probably would exploit my edge to the maximum but as it is i'm very happy giving some back and as fll points out remaining positive.
For instance if I drop 2k on a Friday I can't rest easy and will have mind on betting on a Saturday where in the end I may win 3k back, but if I lock in £750 on a Friday, my mind will be off betting and can even consider taking Saturday off.  The extent of my edge allows me to do this and I feel much less pressured this way

Betfair takes 5% off most people

Many long term winners pay premium charge

Even people who profess to having an edge wont surely have much percentage profit left after paying commision and premium charge.

I'd of thought every last small loss could mean the difference of ending up on the right side and not the wrong side of the line.

No Moves
You can have a very large amount of profit left after paying all commission and any PC.
In fact you will have 80% of your gross profit, won't you ?.
I know this won't apply to those whose earnings go up and down like a yo yo week to week, but those people are not necessarily representative of the majority on here, or are they iyo ?

screaming from beneaththewaves's blog

Bet according to what's going on out on the pitch/court/track, never according to the colour of your screen.

I tend to agree with this. 

A good example is tennis.  You'll be watching a match and assess "how" the player is winning their points and how solid or fragile their performance is.

A few times on football, I have sat without the odds/computer open, seen how the pressure is turning and how fragile the 1-0 lead is becoming and gone in and closed part or all of my bet. More often, my gut is correct and the next goal makes it 1-1.  From there, you can always go back in.

But I tend to trade back a partial of the bet rather than greening out.  This sometimes gives, as someone mentioned, that psychological edge needed to avoid being gun shy in the future.

Example, you back a horse for £20.  Line up the partials at 1.01 to lay.  2, 3, 5, 10.

Watch how the race is panning out.  If your horse has the lead and the horses you perceive are dangers are still in the mix, then fire chunks up in-running.  If the dangers aren't challenging, look at how the other horses are running. 

And as the race closes, if it looks tight then fire some of the money sub 2.0 to be clipped.

The same approach can be used on any slower moving event.

I should start a thread entitled,

How the Premium Charge taught me to embrace my inner loser and make even bigger profits

Seriously, the pc pushed me into experimenting again and I think I see ways to avoid the pc and increase my profits.

I cannot recall the number of times when I have greened on both sides but as the game progresses, the human nature (greed) takes over and I end up betting all the profits (Green money) made on A on B and at the end of the game, A wins, thus leaving me with nothing but lost time, energy and unnecessary tension! So, the morale here is: Never let the gambler in you take over the trader, which I concede is ALWAYS easier said than done!
It's all about discipline! We are here to TRADE and make money NO MATTER WHO WINS OR LOSES AT THE END OF THE GAME! No matter how minimal the profit (green) can be. It's better than losing on a normal betting site.

Good stuff pxb. I've made hundreds of thousands avoiding the PC. Easy when you realise how.

Funny thing is that I didn't even need to avoid it. Scaremongering on here was what made me think I would need to avoid it...

Fred
A legend in the making ?

[x] Pleasing Fred?

Just to sum up lads, pxb and fred are now saying that the PC is a good thing, as it has resulted in them thinking "more deeply" and finding ways to make even more money.
Wonders never cease.

Wonders never cease.

Congratulations Froggie.

You are the first person I've put on ignore.

I've been ignoring you for ages.
Welcome aboard.

Btw don't ever stop posting on here.
I tend to find your particular posts quite amusingly ridiculous.
I'm just really trying to protect some innocent on here from ever starting to take you seriously.
But of course then they would have to take me seriously to heed my warning.
Bit of a conundrum that.

I just realised that it is a bit unfair of me to snipe at you like this, as you now apparently can't read and reply accordingly. Which sort of takes the edge of things.
So I will stop.

" --edge off things "

Late night/early morning bs.Don't worry folks.

Hello there FAFH

You say "I'm just really trying to protect some innocent on here from ever starting to take you seriously." but if you make snipes at people then people won't like you and consequently listen to what you have to say. If you disagree with someone just say so no need to have little digs.

Just like "I just realised that it is a bit unfair of me to snipe at you like this, as you now apparently can't read and reply accordingly. Which sort of takes the edge of things." Not entirely sure what you are trying to say here but to me it just looks like another little snipe. Life's too short froggy for this, it doesn't get you anywhere either.

For what it's worth i actually agree that facing the pc can make you think about other ways in which you bet and incorporate new strategies which, because of fear of failure you might not have implemented already. Of course there is always the possibility of this being a bad thing as well as good.

You're right UA.
Your points are well meant and well taken by me.
But unfortunately something always snaps in me when I perceive tripe being potrayed as wisdom.
I understand perfectly that certain strategies can be undertaken to ameliorate the impact of the PC, but to say that one can turn the PC on its head to make fortunes is just plain wrong and misleading.
Sorry to have upset you or anybody else, except of course the intended targets.

I think you can do positive greening up. for example in the french open final I backed nadal. when he was 4-2 up in the third set, I could have laid him off at 1.01, but couldn't be bothered, thinking that it was all over.

then I could have gone in again on him at 1.27 at the start of the fourth, without risking anything more than I was at the start of the match, but with the difference being that I would have been winning a lot more.

I wish I couldn't green up:

Third Round Matches / Tipsarevic v A Murray / Match Odds    Andy Murray    Lay    15100748892    09-Jun-11
16:47         C     1.03    3.00         1.03    (0.09)   
     Third Round Matches / Tipsarevic v A Murray / Match Odds    Andy Murray    Back    15100487874    09-Jun-11
16:32         C     1.08    2.00         1.08    0.16   
     Third Round Matches / Tipsarevic v A Murray / Match Odds    Andy Murray    Back    15099900156    09-Jun-11
15:57         C     1.21    2.00         1.21    0.42   
     Third Round Matches / Tipsarevic v A Murray / Match Odds    Andy Murray    Lay    15099896026    09-Jun-11
15:57         C     1.17    2.00         1.17    (0.34)   
     Second Round Matches / Krajicek v Safarova / Match Odds    Lucie Safarova    Lay    15097159446    09-Jun-11
12:26         C     1.46    2.02         1.46    (0.93)   
     Second Round Matches / Krajicek v Safarova / Match Odds    Lucie Safarova    Back    15097113300    09-Jun-11
12:20         C     1.49    2.00         1.49    0.98   
     Second Round Matches / Voskoboeva v Zhang / Match Odds    Shuai Zhang    Lay    15096507865    09-Jun-11
10:49         C     1.74    2.00         1.74    (1.48)   
     Second Round Matches / Voskoboeva v Zhang / Match Odds    Shuai Zhang    Back    15096462059    09-Jun-11
10:40         C     2.06    2.00         2.06    2.12   


I'm nicking pennies: net P&L is 80p.

If I'd lost any of these bets I'd have gone down for a couple of quid. The most annoying one is the Murray one, the 1.03 lay was pure greening for the sake of it. In fact when I greened then, the odds did go out to 1.04, but I'm annoyed I laid. Likewise, my initial bet on the WTA was +1 Safa, -2 Kryk; I should have stuck with that and rode the whole thing out. That just shows average odds which is misleading to some degree I think.

As I've said elsewhere. Greening can be profitable as part of an overall strategy, but that strategy must include redding out as well. Overall though, every bet made should be the value bet. If you're making a bet through any reason other than value that is lack of discipline. Fear is just as bad as greed for breaking discipline.

In poker it's called "Tilt". There are 2 ways to tilt. The more commonly known is the guy who loses AA to AK then spews all in on K8 next hand because they're so angry and want to get "their" money back.

Another form of tilt seen in tournaments is actually the other way, the guy who won their AK against AA might then play over cautiously the next few hands because they don't want to "give some back".

This second tilt can actually be more damaging than the first, especially at some stages of the tournament.

Basically it helps to bet with as little as you can relative to your bank. I bet £2 a time because I know I can drop 100 stakes on the site and while I'll be annoyed that month it won't really hurt me in the long run. It'll sting for sure, but it won't actually hurt. Therefore I won't feel a need to green, I can happily lose a few quid in places.

That's the plan, anyway. As you can see I break my discipline way too much. I greened in the cricket last night, I greened in the tennis today.

Bet on value, not on green. I greeneed out my west ham to get relegated bet when they were 2.5 to go down. I greened out my Chelsea to win prem bet having laid them at 1.6, ended up backing them at 2.5. I laid man u to win prem bet after backing them at 2.08 I greened at 1.8.

All these greenings were done not because I saw value, but because I was scared I'd lose £6 or however much the difference between max red and even green was.

The one green I did see value in greening out was my wigan to get relagated bet. Was on them at 2.05 and 1.9 (2.0 average), ended greening out at 1.45, but I shouldn't have even greened, I should have had the balls to completely REVERSE. I could spot the value in them staying up, and I was an idiot to just split the even green rather than completely reversing my bet.

I'm not bragging with aftertiming here, these are just examples of where I've destroyed my season with greening. I don't even want to talk about when I greened the 0-0 spurs v man u bet at half time.

This would be fine if I were to red my losses. Instead I just let them run. I normally bet £2 a time, then during the cricket world cup I lost my head, stuck £10 on the netherlands to beat some team (WI? Ire?) and I messed up completely. I had opportunity to "red out" for an even £1 loss, and didn't do it because I didn't want to admit defeat. I wanted desperately to win every bet. "winning" a bet became more important than actually making long term profit.

I was setting myself up a classic "black swan", where I greened so quickly, that I could get green in 99% of games. The downside was that the inevitable loss when it came would be 100x my winnings from each match. My P&L from that time is all +6p here, +3p there, -£10 elsewhere.

If I could have a tool that forced me to only ever make 1 bet in a market I'd take it. I can roll myself enough that I'd happily take the "unlucky" losses, the last minute goals etc, if it means I actually get a proper win for once, instead of only ever winning half the amount I was "expecting" when placing the initial bet.

There's nothing less satisfying than winning £5 knowing you could have won £50 but greened out. It feels like a loss and you end up chasing anyway!

There's a difference between greening/redding after punting and marking making. For instance right now I have in the wimbledon market a bet put up for nalbandian, I'm trying to get matched a back at 800 and a lay at 550. This isn't greening though, this is more "market making", I'm putting up a spread around what I think the true value is. Both my bets are (imo) value.

Greening is more about betting against yourself in running to avoid losses. This is often counter-productive to your long term balance.

Mythical prince : when he was 4-2 up in the third set, I could have laid him off at 1.01, but couldn't be bothered, thinking that it was all over.

then I could have gone in again on him at 1.27 at the start of the fourth, without risking anything more than I was at the start of the match, but with the difference being that I would have been winning a lot more.

It's always easy after the event.

Ror, why do you keep on doing it then?

I'm currently teaching a friend some football value, the hardest part of which has been drumming in to him to let all bets ride after the off, otherwise he wins pennies and loses pounds.

..Lot of people stating their opinion as hard fact in this thread.

Mythical prince : when he was 4-2 up in the third set, I could have laid him off at 1.01, but couldn't be bothered, thinking that it was all over.
= I thought the true price was less than 1.01 so I kept my position.

then I could have gone in again on him at 1.27 at the start of the fourth, without risking anything more than I was at the start of the match, but with the difference being that I would have been winning a lot more = but I didn't think that 1.27 was value.

Yes you COULD have done those things, but you don't do them if they are not, in your opinion, value at that time.

My analysis suggests that the greening up issue is like a seesaw.  If you have an edge and the slope is in your favour greening up reduces your profits a lot.  If you have no edge and things are roughly in balance you may get a small steady profit by greening up correctly on price moves.  If you have no edge greening up or "redding" up slows your rate of loss a lot compared to letting bets ride. The tilt on the seesaw shifts the rate of growth or loss quite dramatically one way or the other if you don't green up.

Try not watching the game if you were confident in your initial bet - saves a lot of pain

The interesting aspect of this argument is the perception of value.

People refer to greening up and i get the impression that they green up because they like to see a win regardless of outcome. This implies that they have no system which determines where value is when an event is in-play (which is fair enough). Then they discover after the event has finished that if they hadn't greened up they would have won more.

From this they deduce that their bet in-play when they greened upwas not at value. But why not, the only new information that you have is the result. How do you suddenly know what value is if you did't know before. It's like saying if i got a bet on to green out at 25-1 after 3 minutes for Man U to win the Champ League final it wouldn't have been a value bet because Man U lost.

Hindsight is not always 20-20.

Cp, so you weren't willing to lay him at 1.01 yet you wouldn't back him a few games later at 1.27? you seem to be
very influenced by the score. 1.27 was tremendous value.

Besides my real point is that with greening up you put yourself in a position
to win a tremendous amount of money on a match. which you wouldn't do if you just kept your intial position.

Take the Isner-Mahut match from Wimbledon last year for example. Ok it's an extreme example but
if you simply had laid the Favourite each time you would have retired from the match a Millionare.

I don't see how someone can come to such a definite view on a price in-play, in such a small space of
time. Better to trade and play on the fluctuations and general human weaknesses.

On betting, the options are there:

- green out across the board.  For trading, this is obviously the goal.  If you have backed, I tend to:

- Go to zero bet.  You backed then put the whole stake on a lay at lower odds.  Works best with horse racing if you are playing in-running and the threats to your bet are still present as the race progresses.  It takes knowing the time/distance of the race to keep you from over-reacting (a layer's dream in-running).  Once you go to zero, you'll have a clear head and can always:

- re-enter the market.  You backed, you laid, now sit back and look at the scene.  How is the event evolving?  Horse-racing often offers the best plays to go back in.  Tennis, know your players. As well, you backed at 2's.  You laid at 1.35 because the match looked shaky. You're probably right to stick to your gut.  But if the team you backed gets their team back in line, you can re-enter at 1.25, etc, if you really want the whole bet.

Options are there but feeling like you're in 'control' makes for clearer decisions.

mythical prince even though you said an "extreme example", your example is using the benefit of hindsight... if I backed Marion Bartoli @ 1000 to beat Justine Henin in 2007 Wimbledon I would be a millionaire.  You can use any example with hindsight it doesn't prove anything.

I know its "horses for courses" but I am firmly in the camp that greening up for the sake of it is the wrong path to take.  I would much rather trade to go all red than to go all green. Greening up as has been pointed out is more for comfort emotionally than any other reason.  I believe whether pre match or in play if your trades/bets are not at value you will not win long term.

of course it's with the benefit of hindsight, but I was just
trying to use an example of how playing on the flucuations in play
can lead to far bigger profits than simply placing one crude bet can.

for example, lets say both players are evs. I place 2 quid on one to win.
if his odds never come in, then I just accept i've lost 2 quid. If he does
come in, however, I can potentially trade my bet and keep playing around
with the profits, trading on the highs and lows, to a situation where I can potentially
win a lot more than 2 quid.

and if its a 1.01 train you have given away value

true, but all depends on your style of betting I suppose.

"I would much rather trade to go all red than to go all green."

I personally would rather trade to go all green rather than all red.

well each to their own U.A.  but maybe you missed my point.   What I am saying is I would rather let my green run that cutting it just to go all green and I would rather cut my losing trades to go all red.

If you are happy to go all green and give away value just for the sake of it then best of luck to you

Hello there dlarssonf.

sorry for my flippant comment it was a very strange sentence to read but i understand your point even if i don't agree with it.

I personally think you should be consistant and if you trade out for a loss you should be ultimately trading out for a profit as well. I don't really get the point that if the bet is going against you then it's ok to trade out but if it's going the right way it's best to leave it. It's like saying "if a price is moving one way then it is going to be value for trading purposes but if it's moving the other way then it's not going to be value". I just dont buy it.

The important thing i suppose is whatever you do make sure you have a plan beforehand, unless it's just a bit of fun.

ah no problem U.A. - i did not take your comment as flippant mate but we shall have to agree to  disagree, which is why I mentioned "horses for courses" earlier.  For me what works is managing my losses ( reds ) and then letting the green's look after themselves

No worries dlarssonf. If you don't mind can I ask a question? (that one's rhetorical) What sport do you trade? and assuming you trade in-play do you have any system to determine when a price is value or do you work off gut-feeling/observation?

I trade tennis , golf , NFL, and football.  All are mainly A v B markets but no I don't use any system.  I just use all the information available, along with my own appraisal of what the odds should be pre match.  Yes I do a lot of in play as well and that is just total observation...  No real rocket science to how I work either pre match or in play, I will only back / lay if I feel the odds are in my favour and this along with money management serves me well but I totally understand that there is a lot that do it different to me

dlarssonf
I not being flippant either, but how does one " feel" the odds are in one's favour ?
Btw I tend to agree with your more red than green approach to trading. Makes a lot of sense to me.