It’s nearly upon us – yes tomorrow is the start of the “Greatest Show on Turf” – aka the Cheltenham Festival.

We hope you are ready for a week of top-class jumps racing.

If you’re anything like us – you’ll want to boost your profits at this year’s festival.

Well fortunately we have a service that has a record of doing just that.

This is a tipster that we have reviewed here at Honest Betting Reviews and we gave it a strong recommended rating, having made 38 points profit during our trial and over 900 points profit since starting tipping.

Get your top tips for Cheltenham here.

And it has a record of picking high value priced winners at Cheltenham that is second to none.

The service has made an astonishing 298 points and £14,900 in profits at the Cheltenham Festival to £50 stakes since 2010.

Last year it made 26 points profit for its members, which equates to £1,300 tax free profit to £50 level stakes, with winners at 28/1, 16/1 and 12/1.

And this service was voted the Number One Horse Racing Service of 2018 by you, the members of Honest Betting Reviews.

What service are we talking about?

Well you can check it out here and get all their tips for Cheltenham.

Act now before their special Cheltenham page is taken down.

The facts are pretty stark – over 98% of people who gamble lose money overall. That’s pretty shocking – it means very few people actually have anything to show from their betting activity and some people have sadly made huge gambling losses.  

And yet millions of people around the world still carry on betting, many of them on a regular basis.

So what’s going on? Why do so many people lose money gambling and is there a way to join the elite 2% who make an overall profit? 

We’ll take a look at these questions below. 

“The House Always Wins”

You’ve probably heard the popular phrase “The House Always Wins.” It is usually used in reference to casinos, who have an in-built edge on all games they offer.

What it means is that whilst you may have a lucky evening occasionally and come out having won some money, over the course of the millions of bets placed each year the casino is statistically guaranteed to make a profit.

This in-built edge is often referred to as RTP, which means “return to player” and can be quantified so you can see exactly how much of a disadvantage you have against the casino on each game.

The casino has an in-built edge which means it always wins over time.

If we take roulette as an example, imagine you are betting on red. There are 18 red numbers, 18 black numbers and one green number, 0. So your chances of winning are 18 in 37, which means the house has a 2.7% edge over you.

And that’s only on European roulette – in the US there are two zeros so the house edge is even bigger at over 5%. So for every £100 bet, the casino takes an average of £5 profit. 

The house edge varies by game, with the house having only a 0.28% advantage in Blackjack to over 5% in Caribbean Stud Poker. 

In sports betting, the house edge is normally called the “overround.” In football it tends to be around 5% when comparing the best odds across the market but in horse racing can be even worse, often over 20% when looking at starting prices.

On popular sporting events on the exchanges you will often see a very low overround of less than 1%. But you have to factor in commission which will eat into your winnings. Commission can be as high as 5% with Betfair.

What all this means is that unless you are able to identify instances where the odds are wrong – often referred to as “value” – then the more you bet, the more likely you are to lose. Ouch!

And of course if we are talking about casino games then the odds are fixed so there is no chance to find value – quite simply the more you play the more likely you are to lose money (unless you happen to get very lucky and hit a jackpot or defy the odds of course). 

Denise Coates, CEO of Bet365, which made over £650m profit in 2017

So taking all this into account, it really isn’t surprising that most gamblers lose money. The house has have an in-built advantage that means over time they will win and punters – overall – will lose.  It’s a mathematical certainty. You have probably heard the phrase “you never see a poor bookie.” Well, it’s pretty accurate. Just for the record, Bet365 made £682m profit last year, whilst Paddy Power Betfair made £473m.  That’s all money they took from us, the punters.

But then at the same time, there are some people who do make money gambling. A select few make a lot of money – Patrick Veitch, for example, apparently took £10m off the bookies in 8 years and figures like Alan Woods and Bill Benter have made hundreds of millions from betting. 

So what’s going on? Why do some people make money whilst the rest of us lose? 

Let’s have a look at these questions below.

What Type of Gambler Are You?

When looking at why people lose money betting, it is necessary to break people down into different categories of bettors, depending on their behaviour and goals. We would say there are essentially four categories of gamblers.

1. The Pro

This is the elite 2% of gamblers referred to earlier who actually make a profit from their betting. They approach their betting like a business, are cool-headed, disciplined and devote a great deal of time and effort to finding value. They keep meticulous records of all their bets, refine their strategy over time and are always trying to make sure they have an edge over other punters. 

2. The Recreational Gambler

This type of gambler sees betting as a bit of fun, something to make a match they are watching more interesting or to have some banter with their mates down the pub. They normally just bet a fiver or tenner and don’t spend much time researching form or studying stats. For them it’s just a form of entertainment – something they do occasionally and don’t really expect to make a profit from overall. That’s fine with them though – the odd win here and there keeps them happy and they are only risking a tiny percentage of their income on betting, so even if all their bets lost it wouldn’t be a problem for them. 

3. The Addict

This type of gambler suffers from an addiction and is always looking for the next opportunity to gamble. They tend to bet on a whole variety of things from casinos to slots and bingo, scratch cards and any number of games of pure luck, hoping the next win will be the big one that makes back all their previous losses.

They are probably in denial about how much money they have lost and don’t keep records of their bets. They gamble in a scattergun way, betting at random and compulsively. For this group it would be best to stop gambling altogether and seek help, as it is unlikely they will ever make a profit from betting and risk suffering considerable harm by continuing.

4. The Apprentice

The fourth category is made up of those who understand most of the basics around gambling such as the concept of value, the bookies’ overround, how markets work and so on. They could, with the right attitude and by applying themselves, become profitable at gambling but at the moment there are things holding them back and tripping them up. It is on this group that we want to focus our attention now. 

Where It’s Going Wrong

For those in the “Apprentice” group, there are some classic mistakes they tend to make that contribute to them losing money. We have made many – if not all – of these mistakes ourselves so know how easy it can be to fall into them. But learning to spot them and to avoid repeating them is the key to moving out of the Apprentice group and into the Pro group. 

Mistake #1: Jumping From System to System

This is one of the most fundamental mistakes aspiring gamblers make. Whilst recognising that following an expert could help them become a better gambler, they go about it in the wrong way. 

Rather than picking a tipster (or group of tipsters) and sticking with them, they hop about from one tipster to another, giving up on each one as soon as it hits a losing streak. What this means is that they are consistently losing money, because they never stay long enough with a tipster to see it succeed in the long run. After a losing week or month they give up, taking an incredibly short-term approach to their betting.

This sort of mentality is very damaging and greatly inhibits the gambler’s chances of becoming profitable. They are psychologically unable to deal with losing runs and without changing their mindset to a more long-term one are unlikely to ever make money from gambling. 

Mistake #2. Wanting to “Get Rich Quick”

In a similar vein is the gambler who is looking to “get rich quick.” This person gets roped in by the alluring promises of riches made by the sales pages of online betting systems, with stories about how some “ordinary bloke” discovered a brilliant betting strategy that lets him live the life of his dreams with flash cars, exotic holidays and the like. 

These betting systems almost always turn out to be duds and not only has the buyer had to fork out for the system, but they have lost a fair amount of cash from following it too.

The sad fact though is that rather than learning from the experience, they will get roped in again not long after by another system making the same promises of untold riches. 

Mistake #3: Not Having a Big Enough Betting Bank

This is perhaps the most common mistake the aspiring gambler makes. Having discovered a promising strategy, they don’t allocate a big enough betting bank to following it, staking far too much money on each bet and therefore not having enough money to withstand the losing runs.

Inevitably a downturn will hit at some stage and they will either get wiped out completely or be so dispirited they give up on the strategy, even if it was a long-term winning one. Had they allocated a more sensible bank and smaller stakes, they would have been able to withstand the losing run and to enjoy the long-term profits that would ensue.

Mistake #4: Not Keeping Records

There is no prospect of identifying where your weaknesses are and improving unless you keep detailed records of all your bets. Even worse, you may not have an accurate picture of what your overall profit/loss figures are. Gamblers can be guilty of self-delusion at times, only remembering the wins and forgetting the losses. That thought-process can be damaging, potentially hiding the extent of a gambler’s losses.

Mistake #5: Not Spreading Risk

Any system or strategy has its ups and downs, no matter how good it is. Putting all your eggs in one basket and following just one strategy is risky. Much like in the stock market where people don’t just put all their money into one share but instead spread it around a of portfolio of different shares, so it can pay to do the same with betting. Picking a portfolio of tipsters and systems and allocating a suitable bank to each of them can help to spread the risk and allow for the ups and downs of individual tipsters to be smoothed out across the portfolio. 

The Mistakes – Summary

These are just five of the main mistakes that gamblers make but of course there are many more like chasing losses or risking more money than you can afford to lose. Those are ones we would associate more with the “addict” rather than the “apprentice” though and it is these five that are the most common with gamblers who have the potential to make a profit but just aren’t doing so at the moment.  

Getting It Right

By identifying the most common mistakes aspiring gamblers make it allows us to identify what people could change so they can get it right and start making a profit. Here are some suggestions in that direction:-

• – Don’t jump about from system to system and give up as soon as you hit a losing run. It is advisable to follow something for at least 3 months before judging its performance. That is our minimum review time on this site and we often run reviews for 6 months before passing judgement – and then continuing following services for years after that. Find some good tipsters and systems and stick with them, don’t give up at the first hurdle. 
• – Avoid big bold sales claims promising you fantastic returns. The old phrase “if it seems too good to be true it probably is” contains a lot of wisdom. If something claims to make thousands of pounds per month in profit, ask yourself why the author is selling it for a fraction of that. Wait to see if the system stands up to testing from a trusted third party like a review site, or if its results aren’t independently verified anywhere then just avoid it – most likely it’s a scam. 
• – Make sure you have a big enough betting bank. It is easy not to allocate a big enough betting bank to following a tipster or system. Often the tipster themselves won’t even advise a big enough bank. But if you have a suitable bank it will make it a lot less stressful to follow the tipster and those drawdowns will be much more bearable. A rule of thumb is look at the advised betting bank and then double it – that will probably be more appropriate.
• – Compound your winnings. Using a bigger betting bank will mean smaller stakes, but you can grow those stakes by compounding the winnings or using a fixed percentage of your bank (e.g. 1%) on each bet. Einstein called compounding “the eighth wonder of the world” and if you allow your bank to grow in this way then the rewards can be quite amazing.
• – Don’t place random bets. When there’s a big sporting event on with lots of hype around it, there is a temptation to put a bet on to make it more interesting. Other times you may be bored and fancy a wager. Don’t do it – professionals never would.  
• – Keep records of all your bets. This will allow you to keep on top of all your betting and see where you are going wrong – and right, thus facilitating improvement. 
• – Spread your risk. Decide how much money you have to invest, then split that investment between say 5-10 different tipsters or systems, making sure of course that each one has a sufficient bank allocated to it. 

If you follow these simple guidelines then chances are you will be well on your way to improving your betting. 

Conclusion – Joining the 2%

The simple fact is that most gamblers lose money because bookies have an in-built advantage. This is called the “house edge” and can be anywhere from 1% up to 30%.  So in other words, for every £100 that is bet, the bookie takes £1-£30 in profit. In the case of exchanges, you must pay commission of around 2% – 5% on all your winnings, which you must also overcome if you want to make a profit.

That means unless you are able to identify value bets – instances where the bookie has put up the wrong odds for a selection – then the more you bet, the more you are likely to lose. 

There are some types of gambler who are never likely to overcome the house edge – what we term the “recreational gambler” and the “addict” – because of their own flaws.

There are other gamblers however who have the potential to become profitable – or at least to improve their performance – if they took the kinds of steps we have listed above. 

Overall it is about a change of mindset from one of wanting to “get rich quick” to approaching betting in a more professional, measured way. If you were running your own business, you would keep records, remove unnecessary expenses, analyse which things are making the most profit, invest carefully and so on.

That is the same approach to take in betting and it is the approach that the elite 2% of gamblers who make money take. 

Ultimately of course, making money will also rely on having a profitable strategy. If you have the time and skills to develop your own strategy, then great, with the approach we have identified above you could turn that strategy into a valuable source of income. 

If not, there are a number of strategies we have found – listed on our Winning Systems page – which could help give you the edge over the bookies. There is matched betting of course, which if done right can guarantee you a profit over the bookies, but there are also some very good tipsters like those at omegatipsters.com and trading strategies like Exponential Bet that have proved their edge over the long term. 

If you choose any of these systems or indeed choose your own strategy, we hope this article has given you some understanding of why most gamblers lose money and how you can avoid being one of them. And most of all, please make sure you gamble responsibly and only risk money you can afford to lose.

Tennis is one of the most popular sports to bet on, with nearly year-round events and great liquidity on the markets.

We have searched the internet far and wide to find the top tennis tipsters and continue to review new tipsters here on the site in our quest to find the best.

There aren’t as many tennis tipsters out there as football or horse racing ones, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t some high quality ones. 

With a wealth of stats now available online and so much tennis shown on TV, there is ample opportunity to study the form and create some profitable angles to approach tennis matches from. And this is what the top tipsters do in finding their edge in the markets and making their profits. 

Some of them have done so very successfully and the list below is our Top 5 Tennis Tipsters based on our extensive research and testing:-

Our Top 5 Tennis Tipsters

So here are our list of the best tennis tipsters and betting systems we have found, from five down to one. 

5. Ace Tennis Previews

Ace Tennis Previews is an Australian-based tipping service that has been providing tips since 2013, initially on Twitter but more recently via their own website. They have built up a big following on Twitter with over 10,000 followers and with their expert knowledge you can see why people have been so keen to follow their tips. 

Their focus is primarily on the lesser-known players who they feel they have an edge over the market on, as others may not follow their particular games and intricacies so closely. That edge appears to be strong, with around a 10% ROI (return on investment) achieved on the tips to date. From reading the in-depth analysis you receive with the tips you can see their knowledge is indeed very in-depth and a great deal of research goes into the selections. 

4. Tennis Only

This service is from the Tipstrr platform and is the appropriately-named  “Tennis Only” – indicating that it tips just on tennis and no other sports. That choice to specialise certainly seems to have worked very well for them, with an excellent return on investment of over 20% achieved to date with a very high strike rate of over 60%. 

Many of the tips are accumulator bets including doubles, trebles and four-folds and come in both men’s and women’s tournaments, mainly on the main ATP and WTA tours. The bets are quite selective, with just four tips per week so they are looking at value bets rather than volume. In grand slams there will be more bets of course, as would be the case with most tennis services. 

With strong results achieved to date, Tennis Only is a service worth checking out.  

3. Love Winners

Love Winners is a sports betting service that covers a range of sports, including tennis. Their tennis service is impressive, having made considerable profits to date. They offer both free tips, which have achieved a return on investment of 8% to date, and Premium Tips which have averaged a return on investment of 21%. That has been achieved over the course of a large number of bets, with over 400 match tips for the free tips and over 600 for the Premium Tips. 

Their tipster is particularly strong on WTA events, in which his return is an excellent 47% and they enjoy the grand slam events, having achieved a 34% ROI on the French Open and 24% ROI on Wimbledon.  

So all in all Love Winners is well worth checking out for their tennis tips. 

2. The Goat

This service deserves an award simply for having such an interesting name, but in fact they have established a very strong tipping record in their own right. We thought at first the “Goat” might refer to “greatest of all time” but with a picture of a goat on the homepage we are not so sure. 

However, the important thing is that the tips have been very profitable so far, with a return on investment over 15% and a strike rate of just under 50%. That has contributed to over 80 points profit made to date, which is an impressive haul to have made in tennis. Bets come in a variety of markets including match odds, Asian handicap games and Asian handicap sets and also double and treble bets in addition to singles. 

Whatever the real story behind the name, The Goat is an impressive tennis betting service. 

1. Tennis Goldmine

More a complete tennis betting package than just a tipping service, Tennis Goldmine is run by renowned tennis expert Patrick Ross. The main Tennis Goldmine service is a betting system that revolves around laying players that fit certain criteria. It performed very well during our live trial, showing consistent and solid profits. 

Included in the package are also Patrick’s betting tips and Spartan Trading Tips, both of which are profitable in their own right.  The trading tips in particular have grown a starting bank of 100 points into over 1500 points to date, which is a very decent effort. Patrick is renowned for his stats analysis and reading of the game which is reflected in the fact that he has consistently made excellent profits over a number of years and is widely regarded as one of the leaders in his field. 

You can check out Tennis Goldmine here. 

Conclusion

So there you have it, our Top 5 Tennis Tipsters. Although there aren’t nearly as many tennis tipsters out there as football and horse racing ones, there are still some very good services you can take advantage of.

If there are any others you think should be on this list, please let us know in the comments below. 

Otherwise, good luck with your tennis betting and please remember to always gamble responsibly.

Phil Ivey, the renowned poker player, was very good at a certain technique, that is until he had to repay the £7.7 million he won playing Punto Banco at Crockfords Club in Mayfair while using it to great effect.

Not that he was accused of dishonesty; it was just that he shifted the odds in his favour contrary to the spirit of the high rolling Punto Banco community. The game is supposed to be 100% pure chance, and according to the judges, Ivey had operated a carefully planned sting.

The technique he applied was “Edge Sorting”; a way of exploiting the minor differences in the backs of playing cards to determine whether they are high or low-value cards.   

You need 20 20 vision

You need keen sight to spot them, but the backs of even the best playing cards have irregularities. These can occur in various ways. Sometimes there is a noticeable difference between the width of the margins around the print on the longer sides of the cards; diamond-patterned backs that cover the entire surface may display slight asymmetries at the edges, for instance, there might be complete diamonds along one edge and partial diamonds along the other.

A Compliant Dealer

Any asymmetry in the pattern that allows the player to differentiate between cards rotated at 180 degrees to each other will do the trick. But spotting the asymmetry is just half the trick; the other and possibly harder part is persuading the dealer to rotate high or low-value cards.

In the Punto Banco session mentioned above, Ivy asked the dealer to rotate all the cards valued 7 to 9, the most valuable cards in Punto Banco. The dealer, apparently naively, obliged. Dealers like to indulge players, especially high rollers; doing so presumably leads to bigger tips.

Then Adjust Your Bets

With the shoe set up to his specification, he was able to identify the rotated cards in the shoe before they were dealt, and adjust his bets accordingly giving himself a significant advantage.

Edge sorting can be used in many different games. Some have reportedly regularly used it to great effect in Three Card Brag and claimed to almost guarantee walking away with a handsome profit on every occasion, before it stopped working. It is easy for casinos to prevent it happening, for instance by combining two decks rotated at 180 degrees to each other in the riffle. It is one of the reasons touching your cards at casino Blackjack is almost a capital offense.  

No Longer Legal in the UK

Following the High Court ruling on Phil Ivey, in the UK calling on the dealer to fix the cards to give the player an advantage is no longer legal. The situation in the US is a little different. Ivey pulled a similar stunt there playing Pai Gow at the Borgata Hotel Casino in Atlantic City and had to repay around $10 million. The courts ruled that Ivy had not cheated nor committed fraud, but the casino was entitled to retain the money.

His technique at Borgata was somewhat different. He took along a guest, Cheng Yin Sun, and insisted on using purple Gemaco Borgata playing cards. Sun had spent many hundreds of hours studying minuscule flaws in that particular brand of cards and so was well placed to help Ivy win a fortune.

Don’t Try This at Home

Can an ordinary player take advantage of the technique? In informal games where players handle and deal the cards edge sorting may be possible, but it’s unlikely to work in a casino. We recommend that you don’t try it, but if you do then don’t get caught – it is illegal in the UK.

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