Posts Tagged djokovic
Underneath a legendary Tennis match
Posted by Peter Webb in Tennis on January 30th, 2012
Not many words can describe the fantastic Men’s final at the Australian open tennis, so I wont try. But to say it was special, would definitely be an understatement. I started the match half dressed having not risen early enough to get changed properly, broke for a full Sunday lunch and still returned for a hour of excitement. Amazing stuff.
The great thing about these matches is that pretty much any trading strategy you adopt will win. If somebody goes from being a set up to a set down, or nearly a set down, you could have backed or laid either and had the opportunity to trade out at a profit. In this match it swung backwards and forwards on a number of occasions. In total, when I was active on the market, I counted 10 breaks of serve, excluding tie breaks.
At the start of the match you could back Djokovic for 1.71 and Nadal for 2.40. From there the start of each set had odds as follows: 2.28 & 1.74, 1.60 & 2.64, 1.14 & 7.8 then the final set started around 2′s as both players struggled into the sixth hour. If you would have laid Djokovic at his start price and got out at 2′s then laid again at your entry price to repeat the trade; you would have turned a trade at least seven times. This would have returned more than double your stake. Laying both at 1.16 would have worked as well returning an 84% profit on your stake. Timing either strategy would have increased your potential significantly.
I’ve put some charts on the forum, they wouldn’t fit on here. The Betfair charts are a bit ‘squashed’ and not linear, so these charts give a clearer picture of the match. In total £46.2m in matched bets were traded on the market, £42m in-play. Amazing stuff.

Awesome match
Posted by Peter Webb in Bet Angel on September 10th, 2011
At last, a real classic match to talk about at the US Open. Djokovic through to the final after defeating Federer, again, in the semi final from two match points down. A great trading match as well, with some clear cut entry and exit points.


Well done Djokovic
Posted by Peter Webb in Bet Angel on July 3rd, 2011
Well played and and excellent job so far this year. A remarkable season so far, I wonder what heights he will reach this year?
I managed to call the final just right as it was easy to read and conformed to most entry and exit points. Wimbledon has been great this year. It’s probably the best tournament I have traded in terms of results and very few mistakes. This is rare, as you expect a few howlers through a grand slam.
Now the Tennis tour slowly rolls over the pond to the US. So some late night matches to focus on. I hope you had a good tournament.

Meanwhile
Posted by Peter Webb in Bet Angel on July 1st, 2011
OK, I’m still digesting the news a bit. But while I do that, there is still some great sport on.
The two Wimbledon semi finals are priced around the same level, 1.58 for the favourite, but we have two different contests IMHO.
The head-to-heads tell a different tale: -
Djokovic should be favourite, sure, but Tsonga leads Djokovic 5-2 in head to heads. Though this is the first time they’ve met on grass.
Nadal should also easily be the favourite but looks better value at the same price. Murray has only managed four wins in 15 encounters with Nadal and lost in straight sets to Nadal at this stage last year, and again recently in the French Open semi-finals.
Patriotic fervour and money may be behind a longer Nadal price but it doesn’t look justified. Of course at 2.68 it’s not impossible for Murray to win either, IF the odds are correct. However it seems we have two different matches on our hands despite the similar odds.
Well done Nadal
Posted by Peter Webb in Bet Angel on September 14th, 2010
Well done to Rafa Nadal who completed a career grand slam this morning, UK time, at the US Open. He looked good value for the win, though I only stayed up till 11pm to watch it, but at that point the rain stopped play. I looked at the recording and spreadsheet data this morning for the part I missed. It didn’t appear to restart till 1am this morning.
It’s been a good trading tournament and I took forward my Wimbledon experiance by testing the market further using Tennis Trader. As a consequence, I’ve uncovered some new ideas I hadn’t thought of before. I’ll look to take those forward in the remainder of the Tennis season.
Last night Tennis trader highlighted a wonderful opportunity with Nadal serving at 1-2 in the second set. It pointed out a possible 12 tick move for laying Nadal, with only a two tick loss if he held. Nadal promptly lost his serve and the price moved out 12 ticks. I have a lot more confidence now when I am on a Tennis match, which fits in with my general approach to modelling a market thoroughly before participation. I am currently working on new models for new sports at the moment. Bear in mind, no matter what you model, you still have to anticipate and that’s a useful skill too!

Tennis trading lessons
Posted by Peter Webb in Bet Angel on January 28th, 2010
A couple of neat lessons were served up by the Tennis yesterday and both showed that statistics don’t always give you the key to actually understanding what is going on in the underlying market.
First we had the Federer match. Struggling with a vibrant opponent and having lost 13 games in a row you could have counted Federer out for the count, but a revealing post match interview revealed what was going through his head at 2-6 1-3 down. Federer commented on how the sun was bothering him and how he couldn’t wait till it had cleared the court. He also, accidentally, revealed how he timed his ‘comfort break’ to allow him a chance to regain his thoughts and break the stride of his opponent. Unfortunately I was not around for this match so I missed this opportunity but it is amazing how a break in play can change things around.

Later than morning / evening we then had Djokovic seemingly in total control of a match only to get beaten from odds of 1.12. The explanation, Djokovic suddenly felt ill in the middle of the match. At the end of one energetic rally Djokovic bent over double at the end and looked up to his trainer. A few points later he was also off for a ‘comfort break’. He never managed to recover from feeling ill and it was an easy win for Tsonga in the end. I’ve captured the movement in odds from the moment he started to feel ill. Just goes to show it’s not only stats you should look out for in Tennis matches.

