My first losing day for a while, brought upon by a cautious all-red trade taken on Andy Murray when Wawrinka’s excellent backhand started to cause a few problems, and a back of Caroline Wozniaki earlier in the day.
I followed the Safina / Mauresmo game in early evening, and came across a frustrating example of how difficult it is for an instinctive odds-on backer to change his spots. As I have noted on more than one occasion, I believe that the most successful tennis trading technique is to lay at short prices on a variety of ( usually female ) players with flaky temperament, who so often find it difficult to close out games. Despite this, most of my transactions are on favourites pre-match and odds-on trades in play at a point I am confident the player in the driving seat will close out. This no doubt stems from all my early successes being odds-on, and plenty of continuing success backing favourites in the early rounds of ATP and WTA tournaments throughout the year.
Mauresmo ( a known flake ) was a break up in the final set. I had backed Safina pre-match, and as I monitored the odds, I was looking for opportunities to reduce my potential loss. As I looked at the 1.27 on Mauresmo, I instinctively determined that the odds offered no value for trading out my risk. I sat on my hands. Only after 30 seconds or so did it occur to me that I was looking at a fantastic lay opportunity. Before I could play my lay, 0-15 gave 1.38. I piled in at 1.38, too late, missed the trade. 0-30, 1.55. I tried again, missed the trade again, Mauresmo went 0-40, chance gone. So a £4 win that could have easily been £40.
My £2 on Petrova sailed down the river at the hands of Victoria Azarenka. I’ve still not seen Azarenka in action this week, but the current odds suggest she may be a genuine outside bet.
I considered a back of Venus tomorrow, but at 1.14, there’s no worthwhile profit at the sort of stake I’m currently prepared to risk.
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