Saturday 10th June 2006
For those of you who haven't followed the diary right from the beginning, here's a brief lowdown on what we are trying to do during the next month.
We're placing bets on the World Cup at several different bookies - bets in the arbitrage (no-lose) style where we back a result and go against it at different bookies with the object being to break even and collect the free bets that are on offer for opening new accounts.
Once we have collected as many free bets as we can, we'll be trying to turn those into cash. We're also opening accounts at different poker rooms in an attemot to cash out the bonuses that they have on offer.
We've placed several bets on the football so far including a Group C special, a full arb for Australia v Japan on Monday night and the first parts of a runner-up special, where we are backing six of the second favourites in the groups.
Another bet series that I had in mind is called the 'dead-cert' bet where you back the obvious winner in a 'David versus Goliath' clash. Even though the odds will be ridiculously low, you'll still walk away with £10 or so every time one of these clashes takes place and it's certainly better in our pockets than the bookies'.
The first of these 'dead-cert' clashes took place yesterday afternoon when Sweden met Trinidad and Tobago. Never in the history of the game of football has a result been more certain. I put £50 on Sweden to win at 1/5 with Total Bet. There's another £15 bonus to collect at Total Bet when we have placed five more bets so that was my logic for betting there.
Sweden had so many shots on goal and chances against ten-man Trinidad but there came a point in the match where I knew they weren't going to score. It was simply one of those days for them and the 0-0 final score is now being touted as one of the biggest shock results in World Cup history.
Now at this point I have to say that I will simply not listen to anyone who wants to tell me that 'it's a mug's game' or ridicule me for losing this bet. Unless they backed a Trinidad win or a draw. There will be four or five more 'dead-cert' bets during the World Cup at least and the loss on Sweden will be clawed back on those matches. Brazil v Croatia may be the next one but more on that nearer the time.
I also made the next bet in the series of second favourites to win their group. We already backed Poland to win Group A and today I opened a new account at Coral and bet £10 on Sweden to win Group B. We're skipping Brazil's group in this series and Group C as we already have an arbitrage rolling for that group and so that leaves six groups to back.
If two of the second favourites do win their groups, we'll break even and end up with several free bets to use but if three teams pull it off, we should make a profit. Today I will back Mexico to win Group D.
Onto the poker and I returned to
I was going to fill out the profile on Ladbrokes yesterday as that nets you an extra $25 bonus but when I looked a little further into it, I discovered that you have to play 200 games before you can do this. That will not be a problem at all. It's money for old rope really. Just don't mention Sweden, ever again.
Until tomorrow.
Steve
Feel free to email me if you have any questions about anything I've covered on this page...
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