I decided that I might finally do a blog. Every Sunday in the Racing Post Sunday Supplement (I have no idea if that's its real name), I read Steve Palmer's weekly ramblings about his punting - often mug punting - and decided to do the same. Mine will be even more edited and even less funny. Why lie pretending this will be good. It won't.
ANYWAY. I write this on the eve of State of Origin. I must stress to you right now that the recipe for this blog will be 'lose on football, horse racing, cycling and everything else and occasionally chop it off on rugby league'. A simple recipe. For some reason or another, people tell you to specialise on a sport. Unluckily for me, I choose to specialise on a sport that is only played in (barely) two countries and has such limited betting turnover on the exchanges that once you lose an account with a firm, it's tough luck and no Betfair to fall back on.
My day started off rather well today. I woke up earlier than expected and even got into work early. Since January, I'd been acting Billy Big'Un about Andros Townsend's chances about making the Euro 2016 squad. He made the 26 man squad and from an initial punt at 6/1, I'd kept on backing him at some decent prices up to 12/1 just before the season ended. We know the rest. I hope Andros feels proud of himself while he sits in Vegas or Dubai (why is it footballers now ONLY go to these places on holiday). Andros will no doubt secure himself a move elsewhere and be happy as Larry. I on the other hand will have to now pretend that I was right about him. Start a narrative that he was robbed of a place by a pesky little Manc that got lucky with an outrageous shot conversion rate. Fortunately I really rate the young lad and I'd had some bets on Rashford throughout the latter part of the season, including a magnificent £2 at 14/1 with one firm. I wanted a sporting tenner on and I got £2. Value is value and the £28 profit will be lost with another firm who know how much of a mug I am.
In actual fact, such small change will help to start healing the gulf in funds from a disastrous Giro d'Italia. I bet on most stages and barely made a breakaway let alone get close to winning a stage at any price worth talking about. Much to the happiness of everyone who follows me on Twitter, who will definitely understand what a cretinous individual I am when I chop it off on cycling. It's funny that I bet on cycling really. Those who know me understand I am not a cyclist. Those who have seen me recently know that I am balding and I have a huge scar on my head from when I decided to go down a Halifax hill at over 30mph without a helmet and inexplicably crash and slice my head open. The scar gets a lot of questions and the answers vary from "shark attack" and "chainsaw accident" to.. "When I was 12, I fell off my bike". Funny old game really.
Back to the aforementioned State of Origin. It starts on Wednesday June 1st and I have some money on Queensland winning the series (best of 3, a match each month for those who don't know). In total it probably averages out at about £400 at average odds of 20/21ish and will tonight put some money on Queensland to win Match 1. Probably about £100 at anything around or above Evens. If Queensland lose on Wednesday, I'll have another bet on them for the series at big prices.
I'd go in deeper on Queensland right now but I lost my bottle last year with Chris Froome to win the Tour de France at all sorts of prices and ended up selling a chunk of my bet(s) back to some lucky soul at 4/6 on the Exchange. I'd been investing all year and still won enough for my Mrs. not to tell me off for not doing the dishes for a week or two and enough for us to enjoy our new flat with lots of new stuff that she can show to her friends and make it look like we're doing okay. It also paid for a trip to Australia & New Zealand in January. Unfortunately I got horrendously sun-burnt on the second day which took the shine off the whole thing. The punting over there was horrible too. Decent holiday though, but did I mention the sun-burn?
January wasn't the first time I'd been to Australia. I've been before. I was a right scrotum of a 20 year old last time and studied in Sydney for a tiny period of my life. I'm a big NSW Blues fan but it's all about the boys from Queensland for the next three months - all for punting purposes. I had a mate from Queensland while I was over there in 2010 and he hated NSW. "In Queensland, if we like a girl, we go up and tell them. They'll tell you to f*ck off probably, but at least they'll not mess you around. Not like these Sydney lot". People from NSW and Queensland are different you see. State of Origin is a three game chance for those differences to be battled out. It's brilliant and the punting isn't bad too.
The punting landscape for me over the next few months will be the same as every Tom, Dick and Harry. It'll be all about Euro 2016 and even the Copa America when I have some winnings to burn. Oh and the Tour de France. Hopefully I won't have been banned from writing this blog by the Mrs. at that point and we can all enjoy a summer of 100/1+ winners stories on the cycling and odds-on losers in the football. If it all starts going terribly, I'll start making up some winners.
I'll continue writing my blog and have it posted every Sunday evening. This will probably happen for about two weeks before I get bored or realise nobody is interested.
Come on your Maroons!
