A kick in the teeth

You’ll have to excuse my lack of communication. It’s not that I’ve stopped gambling. Far from it. It’s just that I had a couple of terrible days that made me question whether I should be losing so much money (and then bringing it back to mind by writing on it).

The date was Sunday November 23. As you may remember, I was about £300 down on total goals betting and £150 down on total corners on live football matches. The strategy was to back more “than two goals” in every live match, increasing my stake each time that I had a losing bet to cover my previous losses and turn a small profit. It was the same deal with “more than 12 corners”.

The first game of the day was Spurs v Blackburn. I fancied an attacking game with plenty of goals and corners, so I had £60 on each outcome. Despite Spurs taking an early lead, the game finished 1-0. There were 12 corners – one shy of the number I needed.

At the same time, I was trading on the afternoon’s racing. It was soon the usual story. After several small wins, I laid (took a bet on) a horse to win at a long price, as it looked as if it would struggle to get round the course, let alone come home in front. But somehow it did – and I had lost £120. Rather than slowly recouping my losses, I started backing favourites to win. I had soon lost another £100.

The second live match of the afternoon was Sunderland v West Ham. Now I have had a season ticket at West Ham for 20 years and have been to hundreds of matches. So I feel that I am well positioned to predict their results. And I fancied Sunderland to win a drab match. But because of the strategy I was following, I felt that I had to have heavy bets on lots of goals and corners – even though I didn't fancy it. So I had £85 each on “more than 12 corners” and “more than two goals”, as well as £40 on Sunderland to win. West Ham’s 1-0 victory, with only seven corners, cost me another £210. Yes, Sunderland were unlucky (they should have had a penalty and had enough chances to have made two of my bets winners), but being “unlucky” was becoming too familiar a story. In exasperation, I had £50 on Barcelona to win that evening at 1.25. They drew (it was the first time they had failed to win at home all season) – and I had lost £560 on the day.

The most ridiculous aspect of the situation is that even if my two larger bets on the Sunderland match had come up trumps, I would have recouped very little of my losses (I would still have been £260 on my total goals betting and £80 down on corners). Instead, I was £445 and £295 down respectively.

My losses were almost rendered insignificant only three days later. After a lengthy study of the midweek fixtures, I fancied four teams to win and five matches to have “more than two goals.” I combined them in sixfolds (for 25p), sevenfolds (60p), eightfolds (£1.10) and an accumulator (£12.50). My outlay of £63.80 was almost twice as much as I had ever placed on such a bet before. But I was unusually confident.

And my confidence was soon looking justified. From the very first minute, goals started hitting the net in all of my games. I was watching the scores on Sky Sports and was getting more excited as the minutes ticked by. With a few minutes to go, all four of the teams I had backed were winning, and at least three goals had been scored in four of my five games. If either side scored again in the Hartlepool v Brighton match, I would have a full house. I logged on to the BBC website and started watching the live text feed. The score was 1-1 (as it had been since the 25th minute) and Hartlepool were piling on the pressure. But the game ended without further score.

Hartlepool’s previous 11 home games had averaged more than four goals each. The BBC report the next day started: “Hartlepool were made to pay for their wastefulness in front of goal…” I won £244. But one more goal from either side and it would have been more than £3,200. One of these days…