The last trade

Hey guys!

This is most certainly the last post for this blog. I quit trading this late summer basically. Since about May the markets where not the same, atleast for me something had changed. I don't know if the merger with Paddy Power had something to do with it but I noticed something after May, that the markets wasn't the same. For some this maybe haven't been a problem but I didn't find spots as I used to. My motivation for trading sports pretty much dried up as well. So I felt it was time to do something else. 

You might wonder what my next adventure is? I've decided to try to learn a new game. And thats the stock exchange game. I've been grinding the Stockholm exchange roughly the last 2 months. My goal is to be breakeven for the first 6 months and anything better is just a bonus. Its a totally different beast the stock exchange compared to the sports exchange. But it's a lot of fun and I'm learning a lot of new things. We will see how it goes. =)

Anyways, thanks to everyone that read and commented this blog. I still think there is some good information in the blog for new traders to read. So just go through it you might find some interesting stuff. 

Thanks again and the best of luck!

Stay Sharp! /Sammy

What "should" the set price be?

Hello! First of all I'd like to thank you guys for the kind words I have received about the Podcast. It was good to hear that you found it interesting. Cheers!

So I got a question on twitter regarding an old blogpost from last year about calculating what the odds should be after first set and how to calculate it. http://betfairtennistrader.blogspot.co.uk/2013/12/question-from-reader.html

The question I got was instead of having the pre-match odds @ 2.00 for both players. "Lasse" wanted to know how the math is done for a 1.60-2.67 match. So I had a look at the card for the day to have an example. Tonight David Goffin plays versus Jerzy Janowicz. The odds on betfair when I write this is now @ 1.65-2.54 which is close to what we want to calculate here. To make it easy we use "Lasse's" prices.

So this is basic probability calculations and in theory what the price "should" be after first set. You have always consider if the match was rightfully priced from the beginning and what is happening during the first set.

Anyways, here goes...

Lets start to look at what the market is giving us for probability for each player winning the match.

David Goffin (favorite): 1.60 -> 1/1.60= 63% (0.63) - So the favorite is priced to have a 63% chance of winning the match. Now its easy to calculate the chances for the underdog.

Jerzy Janowicz (underdog): 100%-63% = 37% (0.37)

So we assume that each player have the same chance of winning a set, and now that we have probabilities for winning the match its pretty easy to get the theoretical set prices for both players. This is probably where the "mindf*ck" part comes into it but its easy when you know how to do it. Ill skip the probability mumbojumbo and just go straight into how to calculate it.

Lets assume that Goffin wins first set. To calculate his set price, we calculate Janowicz chances of winning the match first from being behind a set. This means what are Janowicz chances of winning two straight sets.

37%*37% (0.37*0.37) = 0.1367 = 13.7%

If we subtract 13.7% from 100% -> 86.3% (0.863) (This is Goffins chance of winning the match after he won first set)

And to get this into odds form -> 1/0.863 = 1.16

Lets see if you can get Jerzy Janowicz theoretical set prices if he wins first set! I think you can do it! =)

Stay Sharp!

/Sammy