With the EURO’s on this month it seemed a decent idea when Adam from PMT (pre-match trading, not to be confused with the other type) offered a guest post.
Personally I don’t hold much hope for England’s chances, having watched Russia score in the final minutes last week.
Here’s what Adam had to say…
Intro to PMT
My name is Adam Ersser. I’ve been trading the football markets successfully since 2005, eventually taking redundancy from my local government job to go full-time in 2007. In 2009 with a trading partner after a successful blog we launched, www.tradingfootball.eu. In 2011 with a new partner from Bulgaria, Emo and I launched Pre-Match Trading or PMT.
Advice For Trading Football
Every game has a Draw Inflation % which when high or low we can use to our advantage. An aligned DI% should be between 5 and 15%. When higher we more often see either the Draw drift and/or the Underdog price come down/in. Sometimes both happen. We advise Laying the Draw at the Back price and Backing the dog at the Lay price, once one side is matched trade-off the other side for 1 tick profit. DI is still at 17% or higher than repeat and recycle until the DI realigns to 5-15%.
When DI is below 5% we do the opposite, Back the Draw at the Lay price and Lay the dog at the Back price and repeat as above making a tick profit at a time. Aside games with a home favourite trading below 1.4 this works very well. How do we know what the DI is? A simple draw inflation tool comes free with each PMT subscription.
Emo and I tend to trade the Under/Over markets, one of which video can be seen and explained here.
Why do we trade these markets?
You tend to get matched quicker than in other markets and liquidity is usually good in the 1.5 to 3.5 Under/Overs. These markets are more often misaligned too.
For example a home dog starts coming down in the match odds market, what we will see is the lower scores come down like 0-0, 1-0, 1-1 and with it the Under/Over 1.5, 2.5, 3.5 and 4.5 as market expects less goals to be scored. And vice versa, dog price drifts then Unders will also drift with dogs lower scores as the market expects more goals via the favourite. It’s good to see how markets move in tandem with the M Odds and U/Over 2.5 being the most liquid. I have a dual screen setup to trade the any one match, on one screen I can see all changes within the games, main markets and on my other screen I have the PMT automated tool that updates Betfair, Pinnacle, SBO and Spread prices when changes are made. Pinnacle is very good 2-3 hours right up to kick off and Betfair sometimes follows Pinnacle movement. SBO is more for Asian trends and Spreads for early trades like the day before, Internationals, C League/Europa.
When the market is settled and stable i.e. no big movements in either M Odds or U/Over 2.5 we recommend Backing at Lay price on the Correct Score market and once matched Laying at the Back price and taking a tick profit, with good liquidity this if often a low-risk maneuver.
It’s best to concentrate on high liquidity games like live televised games, top leagues etc. Low liquidity = big gaps, poor prices and you may struggle to get matched, even worse – having to take a poor price or loss.
If football trading’s your thing PMT has its own chatroom, including a couple of pro-traders on a regular basis. Trading can be a lonely task so it’s good to have a little banter while looking for opportunities.
If you have any questions, feel free to drop me an email.
You can find Adam and the gang here! – Pre-Match Trading
Related Article: Football Trading Strategies