Money Management in Pro Betting Explained

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By Peter Baltic


No matter how good your betting abilities are, there's absolutely no way to consistently make money from sports betting, if you don't manage your betting bankroll the right way. If you're planning to wager all your betting money every time, you just need one loss to get bankrupt. This is obviously an extremely exaggerated case. Still, people tend to think more about winning money then preserving their bankroll from evaporating quickly. Absolutely, undoubtedly you need to learn money management, since it should be the fundamental element of your pro betting strategy. It's money management making the primary distinction between gambling on sports betting and making a betting investment. Below there is a handful of simple tips that ought to help you with finding the right approach.

What is Your Betting Edge?

If you are just beginning, it's not easy to estimate. Once I began betting on my own predictions, I thought I probably didn't have any edge whatsoever. I thought I really could make money, yet I couldn't have been certain. I understood there is a chance I would break even or generate losses over time. I desired to have a safe betting bankroll, that would permit me not to stress of losing everything. I made a decision to merely bet on one football (soccer) league (because you should focus your betting and that's the rule I follow) , probably one to three bets every weekend. I took the middle number (2) and multiplied it times the number of match weekends for the full season. For the league I wager on, it is 30, so it totaled as 60 bets. To have the comfort of a cushion just in case my picks go wrong all the time, I made a decision of setting the betting bankroll at 50 units. That's 2% stake per bet. I knew that should be more than enough. I ended up in profit, nevertheless it was very comfortable knowing I was not setting myself for too much risk.

If you have a sample of bets already, you are able to discover your betting edge very easily. Just have a look at the ROI number (Return on investment) and that's about it. Say it's 15%, that simply means you've got a 15% edge over the bookmaker in the long run. Naturally, the higher the sample of wagers, the better the accuracy of the figure. Fifty bets is a good amount to start looking at that figure with some importance.

No worries if after individual 50 bets you lost money or are around break even. Soon you will gain more betting knowledge, your skill will establish together with your edge. First concentrate on how to manage your the betting money and risk to actually remain on the field. And enjoy your betting!

Odds Matters

Another thing you have to consider are average odds for your bets. It's different if you bet on a tennis player to win at 1.80 odds and when you wager on an unknown horse to win a big race at 20.00. In the second situation, a larger bankroll is desired to face up to likely longer losing runs. However, in case your bet wins then you are shipped an enjoyable amount.

Moving back to our betting edge estimation, let us have a look at two good examples in which you have 10% Return on Investment over a pretty big sample of bets:

1. Betting on soccer, average odds: 2.00

2. Betting on horses, average odds: 20.00

It's rather simple to spot, that in the first scenario you should (statistically looking) win a little more than one of two games. And in the latter case a win happens once in about 18 or 19 events.

You can of course vary your stake size if you bet on wider odds range. I'll present you an example to clarify it a bit more. I typically bet on odds around 1.75-2.80 area. But every now and then, if I see a pretty nice value spot, I take longer odds (like 5.00 or 6.00). In that scenario, I only stake half of my normal unit. So I really use 2 stake sizes: 1pt and 0.5pt. There are punters who vary these sizes even more than that. And you can take that into consideration as well if you bet on wide odds range often.

Loss Tolerance

This is different for each person. You need to ask yourself, how much of your betting bankroll you may be willing to lose without hurting your confidence in your skills.

I look at this factor in percentage (%) of my total betting bankroll. As I said previously, when I was starting out I divided my capital in fifty units. I took my possible losses into account when deciding this, too. If my edge (so ROI as well) would be really negative, like -30% or so, over sixty bets (full season) I would lose eighteen units of the mentioned quantity. That's just about 35% of my whole betting bankroll. 1 unit was a rather small amount of money then. I was just beginning my betting journey and didn't want to have too much on the line early on. Plus, losing as much was essentially my worst case scenario, I truly expected I was going to be better than that ;)

Do Not Start Too Big

Here I just want to remind you once again that you should look at betting as a marathon, not a sprint. It is really tempting to bet with significant amounts from the start, I know. Believe me though, that is not going to make you any good. You can't know how big your edge is, if any, so there's little point in risking too much, right? Start your betting with smaller stakes and expand as you progress.

Treat that initial period as a time when you learn and develop your edge. And please, use the pro betting principles I mentioned on Pro Betting Blog: do analyses for each pick, research them well, put your work in every time. Whatever your stakes, I guarantee you're going to feel great when the horse you backed wins. You'll be upset if it loses. And really uneasy, and sometimes even mad, during a long losing run. Turn that into an awesome chance to experience all the feelings that come with pro betting. And at the same time, not risk too much. I personally started with very small stakes, $5 a unit, and I do still remember how real all those emotions were. It was great, I embraced it! Then, as time was passing, I kept learning and gathering more experience. And I raised my stakes time after time.

Why Shouldn't You Chase Losses

In short words - don't increase your stakes during a losing run. This approach feels logical to people sometimes, because it could allow them to get back to break even quicker. Unfortunately, this is not the case too often. You can lose your whole betting bankroll by doing it though. Especially as emotions get in your way and your view may become clouded. Often you may feel a deep need to bet more often, suddenly value would appear almost everywhere. Don't do it. This is something a lot of bettors face sooner or later, but you need to overcome those feelings if you want to be successful. Avoid that behavior at all times. Using tips I mentioned in this article before could make a big difference and help you make correct decisions here. Remember, your goal is to invest in betting and not gamble on it.

Never Bet More Than You Can Afford to Lose

It's probably clear by now, but I want to say it once again as we wrap up here. Don't use money you need to pay your rent or buy food with for your betting. This only sets you up for a disaster. You need to have an amount of money set aside only for this hobby. It is a simple, yet very reasonable advice, so remember it well. I want you to have fun in your betting, not gamble on your living!




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