What a rollercoaster this week has been with England failing miserably once again and the spirited Northern Ireland losing by a solitary goal in Spain. Ouch!

For those Betfair Traders amongst you, the England v Croatia game was a fantastic opportunity. I took one position. I laid England, not an unpatriotic bet as I was looking at as tight game and a  0-0 scoreline. From my perspective, Coratia scoring first enabled me to get the fabled green screen nice and quick.

What other opportunities could you have found during this match?

Well, with Croatia 2-0 up, their odds were short enough for a speculative lay. Or you could have backed the draw, or even backed England at a massive price “ in the hope that………….”

You see the difference between trading and betting and leaving. The unexpected occurs on a regular basis and there was no way I could have seen England’s recovery. Even though Croatia went on to win, at 2-2 you would have been in a great position to have traded out of the above mentioned selections.

These situations happen on a regular basis. Speculative trades “in the hope that” can really pay off, just as long as you use a stake you can write off. The most famous game of course was Liverpool v Milan in the Chamios League final. Laying Milan at half time at 1.01 would have cost you £1 for every potential £100 win - surely worth it, as Loreal would say! AND SO IT PROVED!

If you’re a horse racing in running player, the jumps allow for some good “ in the hope that” bets especially when a certain A P McCoy has seemingly no chance at all. Dr McFab traded at 9 in the final yards of the race on Tuesday and McCoy literally picked the horse up to win over the line.

You can pre place these “in the hope that…”bets into the in running markets on favourites, perhaps placing a cheeky bet at 14 or 15, in the hope that the favourite has a problem somewhere along the line BUT recovers.
 
The great thing about this little strategy is that your stakes can remain small because you are looking always at big prices.

You’ll remember a strategy I’ve talked  about in previous emails, You know the one, start to back a team who are expected to win comfortably , if they are 1-0 or even better, 2-0 down. Why? You’re getting enhanced odds about a 1/5 or 1/6 shot.

This really is the great advantage of the in running markets on betfair and I encourage you to play around.  A recent example was Staines v Stockport. Staines scored first  -the part timers took an unexpected lead. I laid Staines this time at odds of 2. I was getting odds of 2 about a team who were 5 prior to the match start. Stockport eventually scored an equaliser as I would have expected from the full timers.

So this system can work both ways. 

The blog at www.laytheodds.com/blog has been ticking over nicely and I hope you’ve enjoyed it. The each way methodology seems to be selecting a good proportion of winners and placed horses and I hope you can see the methodology of the system used.

I’ve got my hands on a couple of new systems to keep an eye on on your behalf – the punters prophet and laying confidential. Early days and you’ll get a full update next week so stay tuned.

Have a great betting weekend. I’ll include myselected football picks for the weekend on the horse racing blog – I did great mid week with a lay of England and a back of Crouch and Lampard to score. ( this could have been foreseen with the “1 up front” strategy of Steve Mc Clown (RIP)