Do tipsters bring the price down?

Clydebank is right. Almost all of that advice is bad.

It's quite hard to understand how an alleged pro would advise this:

10. Don't take short prices. Since the advent of GPT the professionals will tell you that 2/7 about a 1/5 shot is OK. But it's not for me, I seldom bet at odds-on. Further in horse racing I never take less than 2/1 about a selection.

unless he's trying to scare people off and protect those short prices for himself.

viva i think i read somewhere that hes a traditionalist, bets primarily on racecourse and thats where he makes his money..having said that it did surprise me too

Do tipsters bring the price down?

i bet on golf and there are a few tipsters elliott, racing post and a few others who are very influential

(keith elliott changed the face of golf betting with his books ....)


whether thats because of weight of money following the tipsters  or because the books chop their selections just in case, i dont know.

i miss that damn book 

I have another question for you all???

Are there any tipsters that are really worth subscribing to? It seems like the best ones are very costly?

My stakes are quite low (usually £2) so they'd have to be bloody good for me to make a profit!

Those who can, bet. Those who can't, tip.

as you say sheppy the very best will cost you a pretty packet, forget about tipsters just try and find an edge of your own, its not easy but if you put the hours in you'll give yourself a chance

Some posts I have read in the lasts couple of years:

1)Always try and attain a profit for the event before it commences. Outcomes of any sporting action is always subject to a certain amount of randominess and uncertainty the idea is to concentrate on trading a profit rather than outright betting.

2)Idea two was a quote borrowed from the stock exchange.... to buy on rumour and sell on confirmation. The rumour may leave you room to make a profit on speculative trading.........the confirmed news means you've already missed the boat and the value in the price has almost certainly gone.

3)markets in play have tendencies to overeact to events! Say when a golfer hits a shot into the trees the price on offer often rises considerably even though many times he gets away with it and even if he does get penalised one shot it isn't the end of the world . It is possible that markets are getting more sophisticated on in play events on Betfair, but its certainly worth checking out anyway.

number 3 is very true..too many punters assume a ball in the trees means a double bogey or worse...cabrera won a masters play off from deep in the trees

moneytree puts his tips on the forum, he is worth opposing

there have been a few threads over the years based on tipsters selections, either backing or laying them

alan keyte probably the most notable..as for money tree its just uncanny how he does it

one guy is currently backing steve palmers tips on golf, just hit profit on the season !

Cheers guys, you're all very helpful!

It's great to be in the company of so many experts! Or people that speak a lot of sense anyway!

I've actually got tips off Betfair forums and they haven't been much good. But, I haven't really followed them. It could've just been a bad week.

Haha so moneytree isn't too hot then?!?

sweetchildofmine - You could be right, maybe I need to do some intensive studying?

are they paper bets though or for real and is he getting quoted prices?

oh dont worry sheppy there'll be one or two along soon to spoil it..hope you find what youre looking for (hmm theres a song in there somewhere)

i think the bloke doing the palmer thread is working to best prices at time of selections and as he isnt restricted
to racing post advertisers is sometimes getting better prices than advertised with the selections.

wouldnt mind getting access to elliotts tips on a monday..im not keen enough to pay for them though

I don't know whether anybody else thinks like me (for your sake - hopefully not!) but for years I've struggled with several thoughts on horse racing. I'll attempt to explain...

With other sports such as tennis. snooker etc. you know exactly how a player is doing cos they're playing pretty much every week, BUT horses only run every so often, sometimes months inbetween races.

It seems like a lot can happen in that time so how do we know what it's current state is like? The trainer might say it's good and the media might rave about it, but to me they don't run enough to be able to work things out well enough?

Please tell me I'm wrong, it'll make me feel better!

as well as betting on golf i played alot of golf and wherever handicap systems are in operation there are plenty of people that will milk the system..

a little knowledge can be very rewarding



my father in law lived next to a small stable, when they were getting one ready he would know as the horse would be ridden vigourously up an incline that he could see, that information was always welcome

simply, just avoid horses that havent run for lengthy periods unless the market vibes say otherwise..there are a few trainers where a long time out doesnt matter so much, you'll have to do some research but off the top of my head david pipe and alan kings horses can run very well after a significant break

donny - WOW you've given me a great idea! I'll just go and live near some stables!

sweetchildofmine - I get it. So basically you're going off the trainer more than the actual horse itself?

Do any of you guys actually know (most of the time) that a horse's price (or anything for that matter) will go down after you've backed it?

I've thought things like "McCoy is on it, it's bound to go down" only to see that nobody's interested in it!

if only we knew when a horses price went down we would all be rich, however if you back a horse before the off at say 6.5, and you know its a confirmed front runner, you could put in a lay at around 5.0, and the chances are it will hit your lay price soon after the off..its not an exact science though, if it misses the break youre struggling

SWOM - Thanks for the reply.

What I meant was, what percentage can people get it right? Obviously if it was very high, you'd make a profit.

Most of the things I back, I manage to lay BUT because hardly any of them win I don't make a profit.

This might be cos I do it with big odds cos the money difference. At a £2 stake, Back 21 Lay 20 etc. is £2 as opposed to 40p for 6.8 - 6.6.

theres no click and win with the horses, you have to serve a long apprenticeship, go through the highs and lows, it takes years to get to the bottom of all the variables and intricities

I think what I'm after is some kinda strategy that is unique to Betfair. When you compare the BF odds to the bookies it looks like a cert to profit, BUT strangely it's not! I used to think that the bookies prices were right, and Betfair's were wrong meaning I could get an edge. BUT now, I've realised that BF is more right damn it!

If a horse was 17 with the bookies and 21 with BF I could get my head around it, BUT sometimes they could be much more! 100+

For months I was backing these horses thinking it was total value, but now I've realised that it's not the way to go.

I started paper trading and it was going well so I jumped in for real and disaster struck!

Paper trading can get boring and I only did it for a few weeks.

paper trading is no substitute for the real thing..use 2 pound stakes whilst youre learning

it's best to look at something like this as a kind of meta-problem, imo. ie, not "what strategy is going to work on betfair for horses?" but "how easy is a winning horses strategy on BF likely to be to find and implement?"

this is a problem I would analyse as follows:

*people have up to a 12 year headstart on me.
*some people involved have advantages I can't replicate (technological or informational)
*the amount of attention paid to the problem is likely to be proportionate to the amount of money involved, which is large.

all those things would lead me to think that even looking is likely to be a waste of resources.

Thanks viva, I've thought pretty much everything you've said and it makes perfect sense.

BUT, I can't accept it! Like many people on here I keep trying different strategies and lose more money. I think I'll only give up when I'm broke!

I definitely need to question the big odds more though. I've got this terrible habit of jumping straight in! It's like I'm worried that somebody's gonna beat me to it!

The thing is, I'm not trying to become rich. It's the magical feeling of getting an edge I hunger for!

In answer to the OP question, certain tipsters affect the price(s)
Kevin Pullein for one, also Tom Segal another for the simple
reason that they seek out out wrong prices, as that is where the
profit comes from, anyone can guess at the outcomes.

''kevin pullein for one''   

did you really just type that??

Thanks kenilworth!

I read a book by Kevin Pullein, and although it was really interesting, the way he works things out is like rocket science!

I'm gonna look further into the variables that bring the prices down.

sheppy123,

You admitted elsewhere (I think) that maths is not your strong point.

Do you not think that that will make it rather difficult for you to outwit the Betfair markets?

4/6 Italy u21s with Skybet v Israel sheppy.  Won't last till tomorrow NAP

4/9 now and the moral is be prepared, be alert and move quickly.

Thanks for the advice guys. Been messing about with my horse racing database. Only got 6 months of data so need more. My programming skills aren't very good, even though I've been doing it since the 80s. I get there in the end but it always takes ages. It's funny (well not that funny!) that my program wasn't working correctly and I thought I'd found a profitable system damn it!

Contrarian - You're spot on, my maths skills are useless! There's been times where my calculations have lost me money due to overlaying etc.

CLYDEBANK - I'm impressed how you knew the price was gonna go down! I didn't think anybody cared about under 21's football!

I personly think Errani is good odds @ 32 to win the tournament, what do you think?

great call clydebank

you don't need to be good at maths to make money on BF, imo.

obviously it helps, but it's not essential.

Totally agree Viva. For what sheppy123 is trying to do though - some form of data mining - it's certainly quite important.

Of course, it also depends on how big your operation is. If you're a one-man band, then it's (normally) important. If you're larger than that, you can always employ a mathematician.

Need and essential are strong words, but I'd say that poor mathematical and statistical skills must be a big handicap.

I feel like I'm very absent minded. Some people double check things, I tend to do it lots of times. I need to find a way of improving my focus and concentration etc. I am also a bag of frustration cos of my personal problems and that affects things.

I spend hours messing about with data and stats etc. and can't find any winning angles BUT I guess I enjoy it so I'll keep on going...

Here's one for you...

I may be missing something here but Ferrer is 1.71, Tsonga is 2.38. So there's about a 40% difference.

So shouldn't there be about a 40% for Tsonga to win the tournament.

Ferrer is 13, Tsonga is 13.5. Shouldn't Tsonga be more like 18???

Sorry to do your heads in like this!

If you and I were in that semi-final, and (let us suppose), you were a bit better than me, but still basically rubbish, then our odds to win the tournament would be identical (1000).

Not precisely the same as the situation here, but you get the point.

. . and, of course, the odds for our match might be 1.7/2.4

I know nothing about tennis, or these players, but it might be the case that Ferrer has a good head to head record against Tsonga, but that Tsonga has won more matches against Nadal and Djokovic.

Thanks for the help, it's much appreciated!

Tsonga's odds are now identical to Ferrer's to win the tournament, I just don't get it!

The only thing I can think of is that people have had a sudden urge to back Tsonga for the title.

Hold on, something is coming to me... Tsonga is French so maybe if he was in the final he'd have the crowd behind him?

It doesn't justify the odds though?

*people have up to a 12 year headstart on me.


this is a good point

sheppy I only have a passing interest in tennis and very rarely bet on it, although funnily enough I had this conversation with my youngest son who has been watching a bit of the tennis a couple of days ago.  He asked me who was the better player Tsonga or Ferrer.  Without having any idea of the odds I said from my passing knowledge that I thought Ferrer was probably the better player and that I thought he was probably the marginal favourite because he is more consistent, but I added this.  That Tsonga would probably have a better chance in the final as he had bigger weapons that might trouble the big 2.

All that said, I think it's probably overdone and that either a lay of Tsonga or a back of Ferrer on the outright is a value bet.  Problem is I don't know which one it is as I don't have more than a passing interest, although I suspect it's a lay of Tsonga.  This is partly on the basis that I think betting momentum from Tsonga's high profile victory over Federer may have skewed the outright prices.

Thanks CLYDEBANK29, that was a great reply!

I too don't have a massive interest in tennis except for big tournaments like this one.

That's interesting about Tsonga's price being skewed due to beating Federer. I bet this happens a lot?

I remember when Murray got the gold last year, the first thing I thought of was SPOTY. I thought he would win it cos of this. So I started putting quite a bit on him. Later on that day I was horrified to see that his odds had doubled. About a week later they were massive! It was like people had suddenly come to their senses?!?

You've given me another strategy here!

Kenilworth :-"...... wrong prices,as that is where the profit comes from,anyone can GUESS at outcomes".The whole truth,and nothing but the truth.

prices are guesswork too...you have two pro punters for example, punter A thinks the current price of the derby favourite of 2.7 is too short and should be 2.9, punter B reckons 2.7 is a great price and makes it a 2.5 shot...now, who is to say which punter is correct? value is in the eye of the beholder

Just picking winners without price consideration will not show a long term profit.

I would defy anyone to win betting on football
without referring to the betting. Anyone who
thinks otherwise is in dreamland.

prices are guesswork too...you have two pro punters for example, punter A thinks the current price of the derby favourite of 2.7 is too short and should be 2.9, punter B reckons 2.7 is a great price and makes it a 2.5 shot...now, who is to say which punter is correct? value is in the eye of the beholder

Is the form of your argument: it is possible for people to hold different beliefs about X, therefore X is subjective?

well for once i agree with you old boy, in fact i would go as far as to say that no-one has ever won on football betting without referring to the betting , in fact i would go as far as to say that no-one has ever lost on betting on football without referring to the betting, wise words indeed

prices are guesswork too...you have two pro punters for example, punter A thinks the current price of the derby favourite of 2.7 is too short and should be 2.9, punter B reckons 2.7 is a great price and makes it a 2.5 shot...now, who is to say which punter is correct? value is in the eye of the beholder




the person with the long term profit on his profit loss is likely to be correct about which is value, but it doesnt mean that he will be on the winner
and it doesnt mean on any given event he will be correct about the value

nobody is perfect

anyone's outright price in a knockout tournament is essentially a multiple of the remaining games they have to win. so it's based on their ability and their probable route to the title.

you can have an easy next opponent and still be in the hard side of the draw.

I would be very surprised to find two professional punters
varying from 2.5 to 2.9, the difference being about 6% of a
100% book.

Wouldn't surprise me one bit.  If odds compilers didn't copy each other and formed their own prices independently I reckon you'd have such a difference the vast majority of the time.  Of course it depends on the complexity and subjectivity of the event.

well, you'd want to know in what sense they were both pros. even if the "true" price is unknowable, it's a logical necessity that at least one of them's at least 3%+ out.

so either that's a rare miscalculation, or at least one of them's going to prove in the slightly longer term not to be a professional after all.

clydebank makes a good point, theres too much copying of outright odds these days..a few years ago at the racecourse, across the line of bookies it would be commonplace to see about the favourite.. 7/4, 15/8,2/1,9/4, 5/2...these days it would be 15/8 across the board

I get the feeling that it'd be far easier to make money if the bookies didn't copy each other.

I hate to use the word "arbitrage" but trading would be easier.

.a few years ago at the racecourse, across the line of bookies it would be commonplace to see about the favourite.. 7/4, 15/8,2/1,9/4, 5/2...these days it would be 15/8 across the board

A ridiculous post. You clearly never went racing. If you did, you would see just a couple of books
open up, in this case 7/4, no response, then 15/8, then 2/1, some nibbles, maybe a little 9/4, knock
over back to 15/8, taken, the others join in now the market has settled, we would have all 5 books
showing either 7/4 or 15/8, post time the firms move in to shorten up the fav SP 13/8.

A ridiculous post. You clearly never went racing. If you did, you would see just a couple of books
open up, in this case 7/4, no response, then 15/8, then 2/1, some nibbles, maybe a little 9/4, knock
over back to 15/8, taken, the others join in now the market has settled, we would have all 5 books
showing either 7/4 or 15/8, post time the firms move in to shorten up the fav SP 13/8.



ok then .apart from every single racecourse in the country, travelling with various bookies, clerks, tic tacs etc..but no youre right, carry on

You may have been to a thousand race meetings but you never, ever
saw 5 different bookmakers showing 5 different prices for the favourite.

so out of 50 plus bookies they all used to show identikit odds? even in the 70's and 80's when bookies werent scared to have an opinion or stand a bet? come on man

as an example you would get the fledgling twopence halfpenny bookies at the back going as skinny as possible, the ones in the middle outdoing them and the prominent front row/rails bookies going the bigger odds

It doesn't happen. I shall have a look when I am working
at Newmarket this weekend and it won't happen. 5 different
prices for the favourite at the same time? lol.

whats the point of having a look now? ive already said it doesnt happen nowadays, im referring to 70's and 80's

I didn't say all the bookmakers show the same price, you said
5 bookmakers show different prices for the favourite, at the
same time. That doesn't happen.

ken wash your ears out, scoms not saying it happens now , it doesn't , thats the whole point, in the 80s when i went regularly the odds were all over the shop , i can recall at cheltenham tearing around to get the best price, because a) certain bookmakers would take a stand eg oppose the favourite and b) others were balancing their books by amending the odds cos of weight of money on their book ie now on course bookmakers know what price to open at cos they're on the exchanges and they know they can lay any bets at these prices

truth is probably somewhere between ken and scom, i remember first shows and most of them didnt even chalk up prices for many horses they had worries about

even bookies extel service reported favourites as no offers... ffs 5 mins before the race and the fav is no offers in the shops !!!

bookies in different areas had different methods, my local bookie wouldnt take sp on scottish tracks, or lay any price over 25/1 as he reckoned they were all crooks, lol

and he was worse than any of them....

extel 

sweetchildofmine, your post at 09:23 yesterday should be the other way
round. The backline books have to go the bigger price, how would they
take any money unless they pull the prices? lol.

trust me the backline bookies dont go the bigger prices and yes custom is poor but they are very reluctant to best price the bigger bookies

they try and make up for this by accomodating small punters to £1,£2 bets etc that the bigger boys wont take

Trust me, you really have no idea.

"trust me the backline bookies dont go the bigger prices and yes custom is poor but they are very reluctant to best price the bigger bookies"

Sweetchild,

Is that right? I must admit, my instinct was the same as Kenilworth's. I haven't been racing, other then the major festivals for some years now but when I used to regularly go, around 1997-2002, I got the impression the back of the ring books would sometimes (although not always) be more willing to sneak an extra point up for a punter, especially one who asked.

This was obviously a time when "dead mans boots" had just been eradicated with the pitch auctions etc and not to mention, either before Betfair or in its early days so some of dynamics are probably different but curious to how it appears & operates now.

If you want to take any money betting in the 2nd row, you have
top the main men selectively, betting to an opinion, and most of
the time your opinion is no better than anyone else, so near
impossible to make it pay even on busy days. As it happens these
days, there are only a few courses with two lines, and during
the week only one. It's a very tough game.

Kenilworth,

Although I believe a lot of that is true, I used to know one bookie who had less then ideal pitches at various courses and with a lot of hard work and some ingenuity, was often nearly as busy as the prime pitches.

Of course, Im talking about 10-15 years ago and this required a certain amount of ability to make it work but it showed to me that more things were possible then the status quo would have it.

(On a side note, regarding your "top the main men selectively" bit, he used to use the phrase "hands in pockets" instead but in essence, meant the same thing. In fact, its good advice for all bookies, especially new entrants, in general anyway.)

im not going to argue with you kenilworth, you have your view i have mine, the last thing a decent thread needs is a slanging match, so lets respect it

lost again SCOM you fool

stalky's in meltdown , lets have a sweep on which day hejik gets banned , i'm going for wednesday

SCOM you forgot to log on as yourself you fool. This Green Envy character is probably the dullest character ever invented.

hahahaha - amend that to tuesday - come on hejik my little jester entertain us before you go

no more today as I have a life - have a nice day moderating & eating pizza SCOM

yeah its roast today at the doncaster home for the infirm and unbalanced, a rare treat for hejik

I would be very surprised to find two professional punters
varying from 2.5 to 2.9, the difference being about 6% of a
100% book.

Imv this is highly possible for two different punters on the horses w/ completely different edges--even 2.38 to 3.2. The race might be a novice hurdle or other class of event on which both punters break even.

Sheppy (who has got a lot of guidance out of you all) has to ask h/s how much he wants to win. Wd he be prepared not to bet for three years to 'go back to school' to get past arithmetic and onto statistics?

If he wants to win on the horses (or almost anything else) here, he is going to be playing against people w/ a lifelong connection to the sport, long-term bettors and maths PhDs.

JPG, I used to bet on the second line and quite often got
a move up on a Saturday or a Bank holiday, to the front
line and believe me, the difference in trade was staggering,
at times taking bets at lower prices than behind me, which
showed the strength of the front line, as many punters just
go to the nearest joint, having a bet without looking at
prices. I made my racecourse betting pay but the exes were
the killer, around £300+ per day, which over 6 races, I had
to win £50 per race just to get level, not easy when you
are betting 4/5% on most races. Still, the fresh air was good
and I used to enjoy my pint when finished!!

sweetchildofmine ''doesn't want to get into an argument with me''
Well an argument with me would be a first, as the only thing you
ever do regards my posts is disagree on everything I say, to a
degree it can be quite funny.

the exes were the killer

The time has surely come when racecourses will pay bookies to come to the course.

They can charge Leicester-style heavy entrance fees for 'punters' lounges' w/ superfast broadband and a good view of the action.

askan, perhaps I meant very unlikely that two
seasoned pros would disagree 6%, unlikely but
not impossible.

I'd guess that winning players' tissues have huge differences one to the other--so great that an exchange like bf wd see hugely greater liquidity if it had morning markets.

The markets are tumbleweed b/c the layers who make up a significant portion of the main market want to price-find as cheaply as poss. i.e. w/out laying any serious money.

Anyone w/ a serious information edge, meanwhile, as opposed to a judgment- or stats-based pricing advantage, will have avenues to exploit this via the bookies.

There are things that bf cd do with the morning markets to get people betting w/ them, such as making the tick size comparable to that of bookies or reducing commission for price offerers. I'd guess they don't want to do it as their strategy is to follow their opposition and run a sportsbook.

Kenilworth,

Oh don't get me wrong, Im more then convinced that moving to a prime position will instantly bring noticeable changes for a bookie, just that I know of at least one guy (albeit some time ago as I stated) that could at least do better then his fellow 2nd line peers through some ingenuity and sheer hard work. I know many don't possess those qualities, at least to a relevant extent, that is why I was curious to hear from sweetchild that back line books were still reluctant to go a point/tick higher.

jpg iv been racing for years, not so much now with front and back line bookies, and the back line bookies were extremely reluctant to go a better price about a horse than the bigger guys on the advanced lines, they were more than happy to take the mug cash, the casual racegoers 5 and 10 pound bets..im not saying i agree with their stance but thats the way it was in my experience, i know kenilworth will return with ''im right youre wrong'' but i can only speak as i find

The back line books don't top the front line books
because there is not enough margin to enable them
to do so. The best they will do is lay at the price
already layed by the front line, but definitely
not bigger, and most definitely not on their own.
Nowadays they have the buffer of the exchanges to
bet back,and they won't go bigger than the machine
prices. Some of them lay short ones on the exchanges
as they can take exactly what they want, and cheaper
say 1.95 about a 10/11 chance when they would have to
go 1/1 on course.

JPG, I can't comment on what your friend was doing
without knowing exactly what it was. What I tried
to do where possible was to always accommodate the
smaller bets (£5/£10 etc) thinking it was better to
take say £300 from maybe 30 punters than a single bet
of £300 from one punter, finding that that they came
back to you later on. Also I never had a minimum stake.
Yesterday at Newmarket I saw a rails book refuse a bet
as it was below his minimum. He was doing nothing at
the time!

I think this thread has degenerated into a squabbling match, devoid of anything much to say about the original question.

no moves, it happens when some poster decides to offer an opinion
or a claim that is clearly seen as false by others, provoking a
response, on top of that there are the mischievous and it's clear
who they are, it's almost always the same people.

no it isnt

back on to the original question

all the top tipsters who advertise in the post will bring prices down and they come down even more when they hit a purple patch, lays as well can start fav and end up 3rd fav.
those who are in the price movement market will already know this but keep it quiet

so is it worthwhile joining a relay service or do their members only get to feed off the crumbs once the very best prices have been taken?

relays are the best they cover them all for small monthly subscription if you spend £5 a month then you should be able to make some decent money just by the price movements of the relay