2014/15 Season Underlying Results

I’m now in review mode for the 2014/15 season. I’m actually not looking forward to it really and after the season I’ve had, reviewing what has happened isn’t going to be much fun but it can’t be good all the time. I was probably due a poor season after 4 really good seasons although the season before last didn’t actually feel like that great a season either. 

The last 2 seasons now have been below the profits experienced in the first 3 seasons and therefore, I suspect the systems and ratings have a lot of questions to answer going forward. When I refer to this, I’m really referring to the UK systems as we know them. The Euro ratings & systems have had a second successive profitable year and the UK draws did OK this season, so it’s not all doom and gloom. I won't mention the Euro Draws!

Anyway, the various systems and ratings will be reviewed over the next few weeks.

I thought I should start this summer with a review of the underlying results. I’ll deal with the UK results first and then cover the Euros later on in the post.

If we can recap for a moment, it’s worth reiterating why it’s worth looking at the underlying results. Historically, there is a clear correlation between the underlying results and the results of my ratings. If we see fewer Home wins in the season and more Aways for example, I would expect my ratings to possible see fewer Home wins and more Aways. If the strike rate for Aways is very high, I would hope my ratings would catch more Away wins and therefore, we’d potentially make more profits on Aways. Of course, the opposite is true for Homes in this circumstance and my ratings would probably struggle with Home bets if we see an Away bias.

Of course, nothing is ever perfectly correlated and we have seen spells before where there was a spike in Homes or Aways and my ratings haven’t caught any of the bias at all. If we’re backing lots of Homes bets and there is an Away bias, it’s not much good to us if we’re backing the wrong teams. Likewise, sometimes the bias could be from short-priced Aways and because my ratings and systems filter out all low priced away bets, we don’t catch any of the bias and we’ll usually be on the Home bets in these games, thus creating large losses.

Generally, I have used the underlying results to try to understand the fluctuations I am seeing in the results in the short-term. Over the course of the season, things tend to revert close to the mean we would expect although every season, there will always be a slight bias towards one or two of the outcomes. Given I have systems which look at Homes, Aways and Draws, my aim was always that by taking a diversified approach over a season, we could somehow always ensure that we didn’t end up with too many eggs in one basket.

Saying all of the above, this season, I have been aware of the fact that for my UK ratings, the P&L hasn’t been in line with the underlying results. Even from my investigations, I’m struggling to see why my ratings and systems haven’t had a better season in the UK leagues and therefore, it is a bit of a head scratcher. Usually, with these underlying results, I would have expected a decent season and therefore, it again points to something being a little bit different this season than the previous 4 seasons.

Here’s the underlying results this season alongside the last 4 seasons:

Overall, the Home ROI is the best it has been since I started out 5 seasons ago with a loss of only 0.6%. The Aways have had their second best season since I started and it’s amazing to think that following all Aways created a profit of 2.9%. The downside from these results is that Draws had their toughest season and a loss of 6.8% if backing all draws. The strike rate for draws was only 25.3% over the season which is the lowest strike rate since 2006/07 season.

So, putting these results together, I would have bet pretty big bucks that my UK rating algorithms (systems 6,21,31 & 41) would have a profitable season (maybe as good as any of the previous 4 seasons) and my Draw rating algorithms would have a nightmare season and a big loss. I was very impressed that my draw algorithms made a profit the previous season when the draw strike rate was lower than historically, so I would expect the draw algorithms to really struggle this season with an even lower strike rate.

As you can see from the picture above at the right hand side, the results for my ratings were nothing like what I expected to happen.

In arguably the second easiest season (in terms of underlying results for Homes/Aways) since I started, 3 of my 4 UK algorithms have made a loss over the season. In easily the hardest season for UK draws since 2006/07, both my UK draw algorithms have made a profit. My second draw algorithm somehow made a profit of 5.8% if backing all games on this algorithm. Considering the underlying results were a loss of 6.8% (this is to best prices remember whereas the P&L I’m quoting is to Pinnacle prices only on a Thursday evening), I would have to say that the performance by system D6 this season is maybe the most impressive performance from any algorithm since I started.

On the other hand, I would have to say that my 4 UK algorithms have under-performed massively looking at these results this season.

As I said above, it is a bit of a head scratcher and it shows us that simply looking at the high level underlying results and expecting our P&L to follow suit every season is never going to happen.

Here’s the full breakdown by month since I started:

If we look at the months for the past season, we can see that for the first 2 months of the season, unless you were backing Homes, you had no chance of making a profit. As we know, Homes are what my ratings have the least of and therefore, it’s no surprise that my algorithms struggled to make much headway these months. The 4 UK algorithms were pretty much around the break-even mark and the UK Draw algorithms had dug themselves into a substantial hole looking at the ROIs here.

November was a slightly easier month and amazingly, the loss on Homes, Aways and Draws was very similar across each outcome. Surprisingly, system D1 had a great month and system D6 had a nightmare month. Funny how a month which had a loss of 1.8% for backing all Draws can see a profit of 25% on algorithm 1 and a loss of 17% on algorithm 2!

I think December is another tricky month to fathom. An amazing month for Aways, a nightmare month for Homes & Draws. I would have expected my UK algorithms to make a profit and the Draws to have a nightmare. 3 of the 4 algorithms had a losing month and amazingly, the draw algorithm which had a nightmare in November had an amazing December.  A profit of 18.4% when the underlying results lost 12.2% is an amazing result.

January underlying results were pretty good and my 4 UK algorithms made massive profits. The best month of the season by far for the ratings. Another poor month for the UK Draw algorithms and it’s been a tough season so far for Draws!

February should have been a dream month with an 8% and 9% return for Homes & Aways but it just didn’t happen for my ratings at all. Algorithm 1 made a 19.4% return but algorithm 3 made a loss in one of the easiest months the ratings have had in terms of underlying results since I started. Another loss for Draw ratings this month which was to be expected.

March is easily the month where I get very, very confused. A return of 24.8% if backing all Aways. Same story as December, 3 of the 4 algorithms have made a loss this month. Before this season, it is hard to find a losing algorithm in a month where the Away bias is so favourable and yet, it has happened twice in one season! Draws were a substantial loss again given the low strike rate.

April then came along, was very favourable for Draws, a nightmare for Homes & Aways and boom, the 4 UK rating algorithms run up a massive loss in the month. The worst month the ratings have ever had together in total and considering they hadn’t made good profits during the favourable months previously, no surprise to see the way the season turned out for these ratings. Although the month was favourable for Draw bettors, nothing like what the Draw ratings managed to do and the algorithms achieved a 20% and 45% profit to recoup most of the seasons losses in one fell swoop!

May was again favourable for Homes/Aways and although 3 of the 4 algorithms capitalised, the bet numbers were small and it didn’t make too much of a dent in the overall results for the season. Algorithm 2 somehow made a loss too this month which means for 3 very favourable months for Aways, the ratings haven’t capitalised at all. The Draw ratings ended the season well although the bet number was tiny.

So, in a season that was very favourable for Homes/Aways, the ratings have had a nightmare and whilst I would have expected losses for my Draw ratings, they did very well!  All in all, a very strange season I think.

Here’s the breakdown by league for this season:

I always think a season isn’t a long time for looking at this sort of breakdown and if you look at the historical results, the breakdown by league does bob around every season.

The Championship was a league I struggled with most of the season to get my head around and looking at these results, I sort of see why. I never seemed to hit the right Home/Away winners in this league all season and the draw was a pest.

The SPL is another league I struggle with and looking at the underlying results, it’s disappointing that this is the case. Again, I can’t seem to hit the correct home and away winners in this league.

Here’s the breakdown by month again which is maybe easier to see than the picture above:

Here’s the breakdown by day of the week:

Although all of the above is interesting, I’m not sure any of it explains why we’ve had a tough season this season. If anything, it definitely points to this season not being any tougher than the last 4 seasons on average and therefore, it’s disappointing my ratings have struggled so badly.

The last place to look is the odds. We know that from the above, backing all Homes/Aways was profitable this season. We know that my ratings play in the higher odds ranges and therefore, the last question we need to answer is related to the odds. Has there been a bias towards longer prices this season?

Here’s a pic simply showing the P&L if backing teams above/below 2.75:

Given about 90% of my bets come from the group 2.76+, it is so, so frustrating to see that it has actually been a profitable set of bets.

To recap, the same results last season is shown below:

As you can see, the previous season was a much less favourable year and my ratings did pretty well. This season is probably the easiest year I’ve had since inception and my ratings have had a nightmare.

Here’s a breakdown of the odds ranges for the 2014/15 season split by Home and Aways:

It starts to look even worse!  We know that most of my Aways are in the 2.75-6.00 odds range and backing all these bets returned a profit of 6.5%. Therefore, for me to not have a good season after seeing these underlying results is mindboggling to me!

Right, how do I summarise this?  Well, quite simply, all 4 of my UK rating algorithms have had a very, very poor season. The worst season they’ve had since inception and given how favourable the underlying results appear to be, you have to really question my ratings after last season.

On the other hand, my UK draw ratings appear to have had quite an exceptional year. Yes, the profits aren’t great but given how tough a season it was for backing UK draws, you have to think that when the strike rate increases a little for draws, these draw ratings can only get better.

I’m so used to using the underlying results to show that my ratings are outperforming expectations but for whatever reason, this happened for the 2014/15 season. The UK Draw ratings have done very well but all 4 UK algorithms underperformed badly.

I’ll quickly look at the Euro underlying results now. 

Here’s the results by season updated to include last season:

At a high level, these numbers look favourable for all 3 outcomes last season. Homes are probably a little down on historical experience (remember there has only been 2 losing seasons for backing all Home bets since 2007/08) but even so, there was still a marginal profit if backing all Home bets in these leagues.

Aways were a marginal loss and again, looking at the historical results, slightly worse than the last two seasons but much better than previous seasons.

Draws had their 2^nd best season out of the last 5 seasons, both in terms of strike rate and ROI although it was still a loss making season. As I picked up in the pre-season post last Summer about the Draws in these leagues, every season for the last 9 seasons have now been loss making for the underlying draws and with an average loss of 7%, backing draws in these leagues seems a difficult place to be. Of course, the upside of this is that backing Homes (and possibly Aways) is the place to be and I think the results I’ve seen this season for the Euro systems back this up.

I think when you see the fact that the Underlying draws only lost 2.7% and yet, my Euro Draw ratings lost 9.8% and 13.6% respectively, it backs up what we picked up very early on in the season and that these ratings were rubbish. I guess I wasn’t totally surprised although as always, it’s disappointing to spend time building something to basically watch it never get off the ground or a better metaphor is probably getting off the ground and then crashing and burning very quickly.

On the other hand, the Euro ratings have followed up their first good season with another great season and I would have to say that based on the last two seasons, these ratings would probably be my best ratings. Considering the first attempt I had at building Euro ratings failed miserably, in a weird way, it sort of gives me hope for the Euro draw systems if I want to have another go at producing a new set of ratings.

I guess the biggest difference between having a second attempt at Euro Draw ratings and my second attempt at the Euro systems was that I was always confident I could find an edge with a set of Euro ratings. The underlying results look OK and I’m sure I just needed a second attempt at building the ratings again and I would have a good shot at getting it right.

After seeing the strike rate for Euro Draws again this season and seeing the fact that all of the underlying profits this season have come from one league (Italy), it doesn’t exactly fill me with confidence that trying to build another set of Euro Draw ratings is the way to go. The other 3 leagues made massive losses for Draws again and therefore, I have to think that if the bookmakers are going to continue to under-price draws, backing Homes/Aways is the place to go.

In terms of the Euro ratings, I have to say I’ve been massively impressed with these ratings over the last two seasons. It’s a shame I didn’t nail these ratings first time round as their proofed results are ruined a little by the losses in the first season but even so, the last two seasons have been impressive.

Algorithm 1 (System E1) has had 2 losing months in the last 14 months and for any rating algorithm, this is impressive stuff. The second algorithm has had a few small losses which has meant a little bit of red has crept onto the page but even so, the results are decent.

The actual season results show that algorithm 2 is slightly more profitable than algorithm 1 over the last 2 seasons but there isn’t much in it.

Overall, I’m looking forward to seeing if these Euro algorithms can build on the last two seasons and if they can, I suspect the focus will switch away from UK bets and more towards Euro bets for most of us following the systems.

Here’s the breakdown by league:

This is what makes this game so interesting at times for me. A few people have suggested I have different ratings for different leagues based on historical trends but the truth is, the results over a season are purely random. No one knew that Italy was going to be a goldmine for Draws any more than Germany would be a goldmine for Homes. Based on the previous 4 seasons, Italy was the worst place to be for Draws and my ratings had picked this up clearly. I had fewer Draws in Italy and boom, an amazing season comes along for Draws in Italy.

Historically, France was the best league for Draws and although the average odds were lower in this league, there profits in 2 of the last 4 seasons for underlying draws in France. Boom, an 18.4% loss for underlying draws in France and of course, my ratings took a bath here.

Backing all Homes in Spain had been profitable for 7 seasons in a row before last season. Boom, a 6.7% loss this season. Italian Homes has been the other place to be historically, profits in most seasons. Boom, an 8% loss last season.

As I said, this is what makes this game interesting and if it was as easy as simply following historical trends, everyone would be making money at football betting.

My Draw ratings were clearly not smart enough to get around these changes in trends this season and unfortunately, they suffered the consequences as a result. On the other hand, my Euro ratings have navigated through the season well and didn’t get too caught up in these short-term blips.

Here’s the P&L by month again in a table that’s easier to read for this season:

Here’s the P&L by day of the week:

Interestingly, one thing I noticed the season before last was that there was a slight Home bias on a Saturday and a Sunday and a slight Away bias in midweek. I have noticed the exact same trend last season. Not sure I’d start acting on this but it will be interesting to see if it continues next season too.

For Euro bets, most of my bets fall into the 2.51+ price range rather than below this. The results have been slightly favourable in this group last season.

 

Here’s the breakdown between Homes & Aways for a few odds ranges.

Big priced Homes and big priced Aways was the place to be last season generally and thankfully, this is where a lot of my bets occur in the Euro leagues.

To summarise the Euro results then, a very good performance from the Euro rating algorithms against favourable conditions although to be fair, the conditions appear favourable every year for Homes/Aways in these leagues. Euro Draws underperformed massively and the results were a little more favourable than normal. However, finding any sort of edge in these leagues with Draws looks to be difficult to me and I guess I need to seriously consider whether or not it is worth the effort of trying to find an edge. 

Monthly Review for April 2015

Well, after a nightmare March, I was really hoping April would see the systems return to some sort of normality and get back on track. Unfortunately, the systems have followed up a nightmare March with an absolute shocker of a month in April. The actual losses aren’t anywhere near as bad as March at an overall level but some of the most popular systems within the service have really suffered during April, so on the back of a poor March, it’s not looking great.

Any hope of a break-even season are long gone and it’s simply about how big a loss the systems will have this season. The graph of all system returns is shown below along with the drawdown graph.

As you can see, it’s not a pretty sight and the overall drawdown is now at 800pts. To put this drawdown in some sort of context, the systems had generated a profit of 2,345pts in the first 41 months of the service. They have lost 800pts in 3 months. Around 1/3 of the overall profit for the service has been lost in 3 months. That’s a fairly substantial drawdown in a short space of time.

What has happened I can hear you all thinking. Being honest, I don’t know. All of the main ratings services have suffered substantial drawdowns over the last 2-3 months and in many cases, the drawdowns have been equivalent to the betting bank for the system or service. In my case, many of my systems have lost a betting bank from the peak of the P&L and therefore, it is very worrying.

Personally, since the middle of January, I have lost the equivalent of my betting bank which has been very painful to say the least. The problem with doing this as a hobby is that I got used to winning and you sort of mentally bank the profit you’ll make every year. This game isn’t easy at times, it can be very time consuming but knowing that you’ll make a little income each year makes it worthwhile. At the moment, my head is in a spin as I’ve lost all of the profits I had generated this season so far and another 50% of my betting bank. In terms of income made from betting, I’m back at a level I was at mid April 2014. Hence, I have basically broke even over the last 12 months.

Looking further back, I first hit the profit level I’m at now in April 2013. Therefore, I have made no profit betting for the last 24 months in total!

Break-even may not sound too bad over 24 months but when I think about how much time and effort has gone into this, it’s a really poor return. A conservative estimate is maybe 1,00 hours. Not sure anyone would like to work for free for 1,000 hours. I’ve joked about this on Twitter but my daily spend the last few months is in 3 figures. People with bad drug habits spend less than I’m spending at the moment which is crazy!

Of course, it’s always easy to get caught up in the short-term and I know I should assess things at season end and look at the season as a whole but even if I do this, I’m looking at losing 50% of my betting bank this season and no profit for the last 2 years.

I have said this a few times in emails and on Twitter but I really need to consider whether or not I continue past this season. Of course, the service is separate to my own betting activities and just because I’ve made no profit in 2 years doesn’t mean everyone else is in the same boat. However, I have always ran the service on the side of my betting and being honest, the returns from the betting is what makes this worthwhile for me. With no returns from betting, it’s hard to justify even having the service and I have a bit of thinking to do over the early summer about the future.

Anyway, here’s the results for the month of April.

Est Systems

Here’s the results for the first two rating algorithms, split by Home & Away bets:

A lot to take in here but whatever way you look at these tables, it’s rubbish.

The first thing that jumps out to me is that both Homes and Aways are loss making on each algorithm. This doesn’t happen too often in a month and we usually see a little pocket of bets do OK in one of the categories. The other thing that jumps out to me is the performance of the low value bets. These have really been a head scratcher this season and after over-performing for most of the season, they have really gone down the tubes in April.

System 21 had 70 bets with less than 5% value and only found 14 winners. A loss of 37.2pts. This is greater than the loss the algorithm had this month, so the bets >5% value were profitable.

The draw was a pest for the Away bets on both algorithms and you can see the AH returns increasing as you take more draw cover on Aways this month. The draw has been fairly quiet so far this season but it definitely hit back a little in April.

Overall, both algorithms had a nightmare and therefore, the combined systems will have a nightmare too.

Here’s the results from all 11 systems:

A loss of 114.2pts from 506 bets. Hard to be positive about anything in this picture. The filtering didn’t work on algorithm 1, systems 7 & 8 were worse than system 6. The filtering worked much better on system 22 (as it has traditionally to be fair) and system only lost 3.5pts. Basically, the less bets that appeared on system 22 the better.

The combined systems didn’t ease the pain either and unless you were doing something with the value ratings this month on these algorithms, you had to take a bath. Although, doing the same thing with the value ratings in previous months would have had you taking a pretty big bath then, so it’s swings and roundabouts. Whatever way you look at it, it’s rubbish this season.

New Systems

Here’s the results for the next two algorithms:

A disaster of a month for both algorithms and the worst month system 31 has had by quite a long way. The previous worst month was a 26pts loss, so to hit a 45pts loss takes some going. Aways were to blame with only 12 winners from 91 bets. The draw was clearly a pest and the average odds were quite high this month (higher than the long-term average), so I guess if a few of these draws had been wins, we’d have been looking at a much different month.

System 41 had another nightmare (becoming the norm for this system) and only managed to find 10 winners from 70 away bets. The higher value home bets did well on system 41 (similar to historical results) but that’s about the only positive I can take from either of these tables. A disaster month.

When the ratings have had a month like this, the combined systems are going to feel the pain. Here’s the results of the 11 systems:

A 146.4pts loss from 641 bets after a loss of 80pts in March. Sad times for what was previously a very decent set of systems with good long-term results.

Similar to the Est Systems, it is difficult to take any positives from the results here. All 11 systems lost badly although the draw was clearly a nuisance for these systems. The loss was only 22.9pts for using AH0.5 on all bets which is about 7 times better than backing outright. Basically, you would have made a good profit this month backing all these bets to be draws rather than the selections to win. When this is the case, it’s always going to be difficult to make a profit.

Hard to know what else to say. System 31 is the most popular system by far amongst subscribers, it’s the one I have invested in the most over the last couple of seasons myself and it is currently on a drawdown of 80pts. Says it all really. I’m happy for the service to be judged on system 31 and ultimately, this makes it a nightmare losing run for the service and a nightmare season.

Misc Systems

Here’s the results for the systems:

Given all these systems are subsets of previous systems already discussed to some degree, these losses aren’t too much of a surprise. A loss of 75.2pts from 386 bets.

Until this month, 21-31 was doing a great job at missing some of the carnage on the other systems but this has now gone. A 20.7pts loss from 77 bets for this system decimates the season return.

The SGM systems (TOX, STOY and STOZ) are not helping the situation at all and are just haemorrhaging points every month like the other systems and it seems no matter what method is used at the moment, the losses are accumulating.

Draw Systems

Here’s the results for the UK Draw systems:

Given my comments above regarding the impact of the draw on many systems this month, you won’t be too surprised by these returns this month. A profit of 134.3pts from 298 bets.

It has been a really, really strange season for the UK draw systems. Coming into the season, I actually had great confidence in these systems after last season. Although they only had one season behind them, they performed well in a tough season for draw betting generally and I figured these systems were ‘potentially’ my best systems. Very easy to get the quoted prices or better for nearly all the games and with good results in a tough season, surely they would perform better this season?

Well, errr….. no. They started the season terribly, clawed the losses back by the end of December and I was looking forward to 2015 for these systems. A loss in Jan, a loss in Feb and then the mother of all losses in March. Thankfully, with April’s profits, the systems are sort of back on an even keel (small loss) and with a good May, they could escape with a break-even season.

I guess my assumption that this season would be better was based on the likelihood that the draw strike rate would be higher than last season. This hasn’t happened and this season looks like being another tough season for draws.

We’ll revaluate things at season end and if the systems have did OK for two seasons in quite difficult trading conditions, it probably bodes well for the future. Could do with a good May though to help rebuild some confidence.

Euro Systems

Here’s the results for the systems:

A loss of 0.9pts from 405 bets. These systems have really been the stars of the service so far this season and in a month when UK systems are losing hundreds of points, it’s nice to see these systems pretty much break-even.

The filtering worked well, particularly on system E2 and it managed to filter out the bad bets from E1 quite well.  The combined systems benefitted from this and managed a profit of 10.1pts from 180 bets this month.

Overall, a solid enough month and hopefully these systems can end their season with a solid May and it will be the second decent season in a row for these systems.

Euro Draw Systems

Here’s the results for the systems:

Considering the other months this season for these systems, this has to go down as a great month. They only lost 11pts from 461 bets.

No idea what I do with these systems at season end. I could use them as lay systems possibly, I could use them to generate more Euro bets (backing Homes/Aways rather than the Draw) or I can have a go at creating another set of Euro draw systems or I could even keep these going (unlikely!).

Anyway, in a month when the UK systems fell off a cliff, I can’t moan about an 11pts loss.

Overall, a loss this month of 213.4pts from 2,697 bets.

Well, another month, another loss and given the downward trajectory on most of my system’s P&L graphs at the moment, I’m not really looking forward to May I think! Let’s see what happens.

March 2015 Monthly Review

I should just paste up the link to the March 2014 review and tell you to read this alongside the results for March 2015. It is quite scary how similar the month of March we’ve just experienced was to March 2014 and it was another nightmare month for the systems.

My conclusion last year  is quite similar to where I am now. “Mar-14 will now join the months of Feb-11, Apr-11 and Sep-13 in my memory bank. For me personally, this is the biggest loss I’ve ever suffered from betting and it has been a wake up call for me. I’ve discussed this before on the blog but I appreciate the way I play this game carries lots of risks but I have always felt like the returns were appropriate for the level of risk I was taking. Before this month, I was on course for a pretty good season which considering the start I had this season, would have been amazing. 4 weeks later and any thoughts of doubling my betting bank this season for the 4th straight season are gone. I’d take break-even again which is what I said a few months ago before things started going well.”

March 2015 goes down as my 2^nd worst month of betting ever, not surprisingly, behind March 2014. Amazing how history repeats itself at times although my actual £ loss this year was a bit smaller. I’m pretty much break-even for the season. I said the same when I wrote the monthly review last year but I would happily take break-even for the season now. The current trends all point to me making a loss though, so I’m hoping for a swift turnaround in fortune.

Last year, it was a bit of a miraculous recovery but I followed my worst ever betting month with my best ever month and therefore, I actually ended the season in an OK place. Wasn’t a vintage season by any means and was well down on the previous 3 seasons in terms of ROI and ROC but at least I made a profit that was acceptable to me. Roll on 12 months and unless I see another miraculous recovery, I could be facing up to my first ever loss as a football bettor over a season.

In terms of the service and the systems, I think it now looks odds on that the systems will have their first ever loss over a season and therefore, it’s looking like a very disappointing season. Ironically, at the start of February, the systems were pretty much break-even after a great January but they’ve given back all these profits over the next couple of months to be in a hole again.

As promised in the last post, here’s the updated P&L for all systems to the end of March. I have also included the graph of the drawdowns.

As you can see, the systems are now on their 2^nd worst drawdown since inception although they still have a bit to go before matching the drawdown we witnessed 12 months ago.

Anyway, enough doom and gloom. This is meant to be a review of the month, not a funeral for the systems and the service. Onto the review…..

Est Systems

Here’s the results for algorithms 1 & 2:

An 11.1pts loss from 102 bets on algorithm 1. Only 2 winners from 16 bets with 10%+ value shows the major issue this month on this algorithm.

Algorithm 2 did much better and managed a profit of 4.3pts from 118 bets. Again, when you look at the value bands, you are left scratching your head. 11.1pts profit for bets with less than 10% value and a loss of 6.8pts for bets with more than 10% value. Not really the pattern of results we’re looking for.

You would expect the systems to make a loss if I’m honest with these results. The wrong bets were winning and one algorithm had a substantial loss too. Here’s the results for the 11 systems:

A loss of 38.8pts from 553 bets. The filtering on the first algorithm made things worse which is hardly surprising given only 2 winners had 10% value. Systems 7 and 8 really struggled again but they had little chance given the poor results on system 6.  System 22 performed in line with system 21.

The combined systems lost 15.8pts from 224 bets which was disappointing and the combined systems are on course for another poor season this season I think. Given the results on system 6 and 21, it’s actually very disappointing that the combined systems are going to post a loss for the season but I said the exact same last season. The filtering on systems 6 and 21 just doesn’t work any longer or at least, nowhere near like it worked in the first couple of seasons.

Overall, a disappointing month for these systems but as we’ll see, this loss wasn’t too bad in the context of the rest of the TFA systems this month. There is much worse to come!

New Systems

Here’s the results for algorithms 3 & 4:

A 14.2pts loss from 134 bets on algorithm 3. Considering this is my best algorithm, the results have dropped off a cliff from mid January and we have now gone past the historical worse drawdown for this system. Very disappointing and after 3 very good seasons, there is a chance we’ll see this algorithm have its first losing season.

Algorithm 4 was more predictable with a loss of 10.5pts from 109 bets. Difficult to know what to do with this algorithm. It clearly has no edge and I’m tempted to keep it going to use it as a filter for other systems!

A couple of highlights from the value bands. Low value bets on system 31 lost 16.9pts, so if you exclude these bets, the algorithm managed a profit. Of course, the issue historically is that these low value bets on algorithm 3 are profitable, so you wouldn’t be excluding these. You’d be excluding the low value bets on the other algorithms and this season, they’ve made all the profits!

To highlight this again, low value bets on algorithm 4 made a profit of 15.3pts. A stunning return again from these low value bets on this algorithm but unfortunately, the bets with a value of 5%+ lost 25.8pts! You couldn’t make this up. It’s like the complete reversal of what we have seen historically on this algorithm. Goes back to a point I made above, the wrong bets are winning on the algorithms!

Overall then, with two algorithms doing really badly, the system results aren’t going to look pretty. Here’s the results from the 11 systems:

An 80pt loss from 627 bets. Disaster. On the plus side, the systems lost over 200pts last March from fewer bets, so it’s not as bad as last season’s performance in March.

Hard to take any positives from the results on these systems. System 33-42 somehow made a profit which is good going considering the rubbish performance on system 42!

Overall, a shocking month and these systems have dug themselves a hole for the season (again!). Could do with a quick recovery in April.

Misc Systems

Here’s the results from the 6 systems:

A loss of 31pts from 374 bets. A shocking month for STOZ (again!) and amazingly, STOZ found an additional 18 bets that STOY didn’t have and found…1 winner from these 18 bets. Amazing really and considering STOZ was potentially the best Misc System coming into the season, it definitely won’t be the best system leaving the season.

System 21-31 did pretty well to pretty much break-even and looking at the results since inception on this system, they aren’t bad. A 7% ROI over 1,714 bets so far and the system is on course for it’s 4^th solid season in a row. Given the mess other systems have made of this season, this would be a pretty good achievement.

                                                                                           

Overall, a poor month for these systems and in particular, the 3 SGM systems are really struggling this season. STOZ in particular is having a nightmare this season after a really poor season last season. Whatever has changed in the last 2 seasons has really impacted this system as much as any other I think. Shame really as a few seasons back, it looked like one of the best systems!

Draw Systems

Here’s the results for the systems:

A loss of 106.8pts from 304 bets. Easily the worst month these systems have had since they went live and nothing during backtesting was anywhere near as bad as this for a single month.

The filtering was a disaster again on these systems and system D2-D7 hit a perfect (or not so perfect!) 0 winners from 15 bets in the month.

Difficult to explain what has happened apart from blame it on the underlying results. The draw strike rate is the lowest it has been since I started betting on footie and therefore, I would expect the Draw systems to make a loss over the season when the strike rate is so low but maybe not to this extent.

The same issue is apparent here about the wrong teams winning. Here, it is the wrong teams drawing. Many of the draws are coming when I’ve backed the home or away team and therefore, they are not appearing as draw bets as often as I’d like. The games where I’ve backed the Away and Draw are tending to be won by the Home team and therefore, it’s just a nightmare scenario where I can’t catch the right games.

One midweek saw a plethora of draws in most leagues and I barely had a draw bet! I then had a ton of draws and there was barely a draw in any of the leagues!  Just want this season over and hopefully these systems can regroup and come back stronger next season.

Euro Systems

Here’s the results for the systems:

A loss of 9.4pts from 333 bets. Starting to sound like a broken record but the draw was a nuisance on these systems during the month of March. Of course, the games where the draw was a nuisance is games where I didn’t have an Euro Draw bet as we’ll see shortly!

Overall, not too despondent and although it’s a losing month, given the season these systems have had so far, I can handle a losing month.

Euro Draw Systems

Here’s the results for the systems:

Another massive loss of 88.5pts from 353 bets.

I’m actually in two minds about these systems now. One piece of work I’m going to do in the Summer is calculate the returns from laying the draw (I’ll look at ditching the H/A or staking 0.5pts on H/A) in these systems this season. Of course, it could just be the case that these systems have suffered from enormous variance and we’ll see a correction next season but I’m obviously not going to have these systems in the service next season in their present guise.

If I decide I wanted another shot at building Euro Draw systems (highly unlikely given the underlying results I calculated after I built these draw systems!) but if I did, I would obviously bin these systems and start again from scratch. In reality, I don’t think I do want another go at following Draw systems (lost a small fortune this season between the UK bets and Euro bets) and therefore, I might actually consider laying the Euro Draws next season in their current guise.

Anyway, we’ll keep this one for the Summer and I’ve no idea what the results look like by doing this but given I’ve never seen such bad ratings and systems before, I would think these could be pretty decent lay the draw systems to follow!

Overall then, a nightmare month for the systems and a combined loss of 354.5pts from 2,544 bets. Draws alone account for 195pts of this loss and therefore, anyone not backing the draw this season won’t be having quite the same level of nightmare as others.

Well, that sums up March. In a really tough season, we’ve just had the worst month the systems have ever had which only makes this season even tougher. I keep telling myself that if this is as bad as it gets, then we’re OK but unfortunately, things keep deteriorating and therefore, we may not be anywhere near the bottom of the P&L yet. If not, this could potentially get very painful for all of us following but at the end of the day, I don’t believe the ratings have suddenly lost any edge they had overnight. Yes, it’s clear the systems are nowhere near as profitable as they were a few seasons back but nothing indicated that they were about to fall off a cliff. It has to be variance and hopefully, this will correct itself over the next 6 weeks or so.

Let’s see what April brings…….

March so far.....

Going to keep this post short and just update the results for March so far. It has been a disaster of a month so far (as bad as I’ve seen) and it’s difficult to find the time to sit down and write some thoughts about everything as I’ve not had the time. I keep wanting to get involved in some Twitter debates over the last few weeks but I can’t even get time to read all the tweets, never mind give a point of view or hold a conversation. Some of the threads moved so quickly but I’ll try to find some time to jot down my thoughts on the blog next week, I've a few days off work. 

As for March so far, not a lot has went right. I’m on course for my 2^nd worst ever betting month in terms of the monetary amount lost but in terms of pts lost in my betting portfolio, I’ve already exceeded the worst historical month I’ve had before now.

It’s amazing how quickly things change and from a season high and all time betting high on 17^th Jan, I’ve lost over a 5 figure sum which for someone with my stakes, is a helluva drawdown! Like everyone else following the systems, I’m starting to question what I’m doing and I think there has to be a massive doubt about whether or not I’ll continue with the football betting & the service next season. Being honest, continuing with the football betting isn’t that big an issue and this season has probably been my most relaxing in terms of actually following the bets. I have a pretty nice process set up, I’m doing pretty well compared to the advised odds (c.+1.5%) and I’m probably following my betting returns closer than I have ever done. Shame I'm counting up losses more often than not but at least I know what I'm losing! 

My issue is the service but as I’ve discussed before, they do go hand in hand to a degree. The chances of me always having the discipline to do the football ratings without the service isn’t very high and I know for a fact that if I didn’t have the service responsibility, I would have stopped following the football before now as quite simply, I don’t have the time for it. The fact I can manufacture the time required by staying up late and working myself into the ground is down to the service but given the last 6 months or so and how difficult I have found combining the football ratings with my career, I would have definitely stopped following I suspect.

Anyway, it’s easy to sit here off the back of a substantial drawdown and say I’m stopping the service next season but it would be a knee-jerk reaction. I’m going to get through to the end of the season, look at things fresh and then decide whether or not I stop the service. If I continue with the football betting, I’ll need to do the ratings anyway, so I need to see if I can fit a service around this or not. I’ll share more thoughts over the next few months as I need to get writing again. When I’m losing money like this, the blog is a great help to get some thoughts down and even if no one replies or reads them, I always feel better for getting it off my chest I find!

Here’s the results for March so far:

Est Systems

A loss of 44pts from 505 bets. Both algorithms losing badly, the filtering making things worse and the combined systems losing too as a result.

New Systems

A loss of 91.17pts from 571 bets. System 31 has had a shocker of a month (down 23pts) and system 41 has had the usual month (a losing one!). Overall, a horrible loss so far with the weekend to come!

Misc Systems

A loss of 44.68pts from 338 bets. In line with system 31, STOZ has had a disaster of a month and a loss of 16pts. All 6 systems are losing this month, so no real comfort to take from these systems at the moment either.

Draw Systems

A loss of 110.43pts from 256 bets. To say these Draw systems have dropped off a cliff is not an understatement and the last 600 system bets or so have been terrible!

Euro Systems

A loss of 9.4pts from 333 bets. Not too bad considering the losses on the other systems this month! :)

Euro Draw Systems

A loss of 88.5pts from 353 bets. Same old story with these systems. Might well be the best lay the draw systems I’ve ever seen! Not much good if backing the draw though.

Overall, a loss of 388.18pts so far this month from 2,356 bets. If tomorrow goes badly, could smash the record for the worst month ever by a long way!

I’ve no doubt given the numerous discussions on Twitter recently, the conclusion for this post should really be that the systems are regressing to the mean loss of 2% and I’ve somehow fluked the first 4.6 seasons of profits but not sure I buy into this myself. I’ve no doubt people get lucky for periods of time but I don’t believe it can stem from Sep-10 to Feb-15 and then my luck ran out completely. No one can be that unlucky to lose so much in a single month anyway, so it has to be variance! ;)

Here’s the graph of the system results since inception in Sep-10 to the end of February 2015. I’ll share the graph at the end of March in the March review, it won’t be pretty…..