Common Methods for Staking Bets Part 3

In Common Methods for Staking Bets, Part 1 and Common Methods for Staking Bets Part 2 of this series, I have discussed various common techniques for staking your bets which I feel that you should avoid. These include wagering everything in your account and progressive techniques such as Fibonacci and Martingale.

In this instalment I want to teach you about two methods for managing your money that do work. Neither of these seems as complex or glamorous as something like the Fibonacci sequence, but both are more reliable and will keep you in the game over the long run.

Fixed Wager Amounts

One option for managing your money which may work is to choose a fixed amount to wager on all of your bets. For example, imagine that your account has £500. You decide that £10 is a conservative and reasonable amount to bet. You wager the same amount on all of your bets, regardless of whether you win or lose. Doing this constrains your risk and also protects you from unpredictably large losses.

There are limitations to this method. It can result in slow and steady growth, but if you lose a lot of bets, and you continue to wager the same amount, percentage-wise you are actually wagering more and more coming increasing your risk exposure. This is something to watch out for.

The converse issue is something to be wary of as well. If your bankroll increases to £1,000, is there really a reason to go on betting just £10? You are not taking advantage of the chance to exponentially grow your account.

Proportional Wagering

This is why I believe that the best approach to managing your money is proportional wagering. The focus here is on percentages and not on pounds. There are a couple of different approaches to proportional staking:

• You can increase or decrease the percentage of your account that you wager in proportion to your confidence concerning any one bet.

• You can keep the percentage the same every time. The pound amount will thus naturally adjust up or down as your account grows or shrinks. This keeps your risk exposure as steady as possible.

There are advantages and disadvantages to both of these methods, but between the two I generally suggest the second. The problem with the first is that it may encourage you to take bets that you are less confident about, because you tell yourself that it is okay so long as you are wagering less. It is my philosophy however that you should only take the bets you are very confident about. It makes sense to stick the same percentage every time.

How much should that percentage be? I suggest keeping it under 5% at all times; something in the 2-3% range is generally best. Yes, that means your slow and steady growth will be very slow in the beginning, but since you are using a percentage and not a fixed amount, you will be able to exponentially grow your account. Someday, at least in theory, you will be taking very large bets for substantial payoffs.

So, to summarise everything I have gone over in this series, here are the major methods for staking bets I have reviewed:

• Bet It All: This is not a real betting technique, and will simply result in blowing your bankroll in no time.
• Progressive Systems: These include Martingale, Fibonacci, and others. The problem with these systems is that they require you to have a huge bankroll in order to take advantage and profit. Most punters will only blow their accounts.
• Fixed Amounts: This is more responsible and reasonable, but it is inflexible, which can cause problems.
• Proportional (Percentage-Based) Betting: This is the best technique of all if you want to maintain consistency in your risk exposure profile. It will result in slow but steady exponential growth in conjunction with a working handicapping method that generates reliable wins.

And that brings me around to one last reminder. Remember, these are all techniques for setting bet sizes, not for planning bets! You cannot rely on a money management system and nothing else. Now that you know more about staking your bets, you also need to learn about handicapping. Only when you have a method for sizing bets and a method for identifying winners will you succeed as sports betting. Yes, it is hard work, but it can pay off in ways you cannot imagine!