Increasing # of matches not going inplay

Football, Soccer - whatever you call it. It is the beautiful game.
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Kafkaesque
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Euler wrote:
Mon May 14, 2018 5:48 pm
It's worth listing the issues on this thread as that makes it easier to highlight the problem to Betfair.
I've pretty much lined it up in my initial post, but to streamline it a bit, here's how I would frame it:

Issue:
The number of matches not going inplay, either at all or with only match odds inplay with no management, has been increasing lately for a lot of leagues just below the very biggest ones.

Questions for Betfair:
- What is the future strategy for Betfair Exchange in this regard? Do they plan to correct this, or can we expect the level of inplay markets to continue to decrease?

A note on that would be that it would be to question the reason behind the development. Is it happening because they've tried to save money by using a cheaper but less reliable provider? And if so will they demand more from said provider or look to switch. There's no diplomatic for your average Joe to ask that part, and not have your questions discarded, especially if you hit a sore spot (the cynical part of me thinks), but you may well be able to ask it.

Issue:
The number of matches noted as going inplay, but then changed not going inplay at a later time is increasing.

Questions for Betfair:
Is this related to the first issue? Would it be possible to have a list displayed somewhere on the website with the matches with a changed future inplay status?

Given that it's likely almost exclusively traders with a big need to know, if they suddenly change the inplay status, an alternative to the above could be that they release the information to BA, if you'd want to build in a feature where that information displays for preselected markets.
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Dallas
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LeTiss wrote:
Mon May 14, 2018 10:34 pm
Copenhagen trader wrote:
Mon May 14, 2018 8:53 pm
I have noticed this too. This weekend at least two games in the Danish Superligaen were not offered in-play on the Exchange, only on the Sportsbook.
I suspect the data comes from the same source whether the match is in-play on the Exchange or only on the Sportsbook.
This is where I'm starting to become sceptical of BF's gameplan.

It's almost as if, they are reducing the opportunities for IP betting on the exchanges, because they want people to bet on the sportsbook instead
After reading CT post I had those same thoughts, with the lack of countries BD operate in and their overall poor liquidity in football markets they certainly have a bit of leeway to try and push people onto their sportsbook.
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Kafkaesque
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Starting 10 minutes ago, Botosani Vs Concordia is

- Deemed "going inplay" on the exchange
- Actually suspended on the exchange
- Offered live on the sportsbook with full range of market options
- Shown on the sportsbook with their "Match display" (don't know the term on the English version) with who's attacking etc.

They seriously need to sort this!
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Kafkaesque
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Okay, the upside to this is, that there's a partial answer to some of the wonderings earlier in the thread:

https://twitter.com/BetfairCS/status/996792901928673281

They're basically admitting, one of two things is going on. They're deliberately leading people to sportsbook by offering live there and not on the exchange. Or they're using a cheaper, less effective feed for the exchange. Although others have speculated the former, I find the latter more likely, especially if it is really two complete different and independent platforms. Either way, I'm back to where I was when I started this thread; that it is a worrying sign, way beyond a football match here and there.

@Euler

As the outward face of all that is good and holy about the exchange, you surely cannot let this pass in silence :roll:
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Kafkaesque
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Kafkaesque wrote:
Mon May 14, 2018 5:10 pm
I've asked for a comment about their stance on offering those medium-size leagues inplay going forward, with no response so far. Also asked if they could make a list of markets first promised inplay and then changed to not going inplay. I'll of course post if I do get an answer.
Just to quickly follow up on this, I got a response from CS saying, they would escalate the query and let me know once they had an answer. I've heard nothing since, which imo unfortunately tells its own story as to how they're planning to play this going forward :x

@Euler, I can very much appreciate that you're likely the kind of person with a ton of things happening, so you're time is of a premium. Just as I can understand if you were to disagree that this a big issue. However, as I've already above, your voice is certainly going to sound louder at BF Headquarters than mine, so whether you want take this thing on has a large bearing on how much I should push for a response myself. Could you let me know either way?
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napshnap
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These all are bad signs: charges for new exchange api devs, devs forum killing, horseracing liquidity decline, 60% premium charges robbery, and now this.
They are killing exchange slowly, making it sportbook's poor relative! :cry:
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BetScalper
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Don't know why people are that shocked.

Now PaddyPower are involved (bookmakers) wasn't it obvious they would push for a sports book and slowly but surely dump the exchange by making it unattractive over time.

I have noticed the adverts about betfair where you can bet against each other with your own odds seemed to have stopped.

In 5 years time it will be the PaddyPower/Betfair sports book only, me thinks. They may allow laying but it will be totally different to Betfair now.

I don't know, just my thoughts on the subject....
spreadbetting
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BetScalper wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 6:24 pm
Don't know why people are that shocked.

Now PaddyPower are involved (bookmakers) wasn't it obvious they would push for a sports book and slowly but surely dump the exchange by making it unattractive over time.

I have noticed the adverts about betfair where you can bet against each other with your own odds seemed to have stopped.

In 5 years time it will be the PaddyPower/Betfair sports book only, me thinks. They may allow laying but it will be totally different to Betfair now.

I don't know, just my thoughts on the subject....

People have been predicting the demise of betting exchanges for as long as I can remember but they're still here. If PP/Betfair dumped the exchange someone else would pick up baton, they went from nothing to a Billion £ company so it's not as if there isn't money in the exchange idea.

Many of us were around in the early days with exchanges like flutter, play2match etc and they had a fraction of the liquidity exhcanges have now. You could make a decent living back then and I'd imagine as long as you adapt you'll be able to make a decent living from exchanges for a long time to come.
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BetScalper
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spreadbetting wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 6:38 pm
BetScalper wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 6:24 pm
Don't know why people are that shocked.

Now PaddyPower are involved (bookmakers) wasn't it obvious they would push for a sports book and slowly but surely dump the exchange by making it unattractive over time.

I have noticed the adverts about betfair where you can bet against each other with your own odds seemed to have stopped.

In 5 years time it will be the PaddyPower/Betfair sports book only, me thinks. They may allow laying but it will be totally different to Betfair now.

I don't know, just my thoughts on the subject....

People have been predicting the demise of betting exchanges for as long as I can remember but they're still here. If PP/Betfair dumped the exchange someone else would pick up baton, they went from nothing to a Billion £ company so it's not as if there isn't money in the exchange idea.

Many of us were around in the early days with exchanges like flutter, play2match etc and they had a fraction of the liquidity exhcanges have now. You could make a decent living back then and I'd imagine as long as you adapt you'll be able to make a decent living from exchanges for a long time to come.
I totally agree...

Personally I don't know what all the fuss is about. I don't trade any market unless there is > 100k matched before I even think about entering. And that means when it comes to football you don't need to worry about it not going in play etc.

It seems people are trying to bet on obscure games where, generally there is no interest from a liquidity point of view.
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Kafkaesque
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BetScalper wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 6:24 pm
Don't know why people are that shocked.

Now PaddyPower are involved (bookmakers) wasn't it obvious they would push for a sports book and slowly but surely dump the exchange by making it unattractive over time.

I have noticed the adverts about betfair where you can bet against each other with your own odds seemed to have stopped.

In 5 years time it will be the PaddyPower/Betfair sports book only, me thinks. They may allow laying but it will be totally different to Betfair now.

I don't know, just my thoughts on the subject....
That's a very valid point, and I agree with the essence of it. I'm not terribly surprised and certainly not shocked.

The main issue for me isn't that they're reducing the number of inplay matches. Rather it's that done due either sneaking it in or through opting for cheap, poor inplay service provider. If they just reduced inplay across the board, it's possible to adjust accordingly. Should the product just be reduced in "quality" as a whole, I would find it a shame but could better say, okay I'll have to deal. When it's done seemingly at random and where they initially promise inplay service only to change it at the last minute. That's just poor service, and I think, we as customers have the right to question what the future plan is.
spreadbetting wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 6:38 pm
You could make a decent living back then and I'd imagine as long as you adapt you'll be able to make a decent living from exchanges for a long time to come.
Agree with this also, but it would be rather nice to know what conditions, we're meant to adapt to.
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wearthefoxhat
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Kafkaesque wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 7:04 pm
BetScalper wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 6:24 pm
Don't know why people are that shocked.

Now PaddyPower are involved (bookmakers) wasn't it obvious they would push for a sports book and slowly but surely dump the exchange by making it unattractive over time.

I have noticed the adverts about betfair where you can bet against each other with your own odds seemed to have stopped.

In 5 years time it will be the PaddyPower/Betfair sports book only, me thinks. They may allow laying but it will be totally different to Betfair now.

I don't know, just my thoughts on the subject....
That's a very valid point, and I agree with the essence of it. I'm not terribly surprised and certainly not shocked.

The main issue for me isn't that they're reducing the number of inplay matches. Rather it's that done due either sneaking it in or through opting for cheap, poor inplay service provider. If they just reduced inplay across the board, it's possible to adjust accordingly. Should the product just be reduced in "quality" as a whole, I would find it a shame but could better say, okay I'll have to deal. When it's done seemingly at random and where they initially promise inplay service only to change it at the last minute. That's just poor service, and I think, we as customers have the right to question what the future plan is.
spreadbetting wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 6:38 pm
You could make a decent living back then and I'd imagine as long as you adapt you'll be able to make a decent living from exchanges for a long time to come.
Agree with this also, but it would be rather nice to know what conditions, we're meant to adapt to.

I recently watched a you tube video, quite interesting in its own right, but shows an IP football market and how poorly managed it was by the data providers. If you watch from 2.00 minutes on, you'll see what happens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tENm5oTYR4Q
spreadbetting
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wearthefoxhat wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 8:45 pm
I recently watched a you tube video, quite interesting in its own right, but shows an IP football market and how poorly managed it was by the data providers. If you watch from 2.00 minutes on, you'll see what happens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tENm5oTYR4Q
That's basically down to sloppy traders not watching a feed and the VAR coming into play disallowing the goal. It'll be interesting to see how Betfair approach the World Cup games, whether they'll be over cautious or let the markets play out so they don't lose out on comms from matched bets.
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wearthefoxhat
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spreadbetting wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 8:54 pm
wearthefoxhat wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 8:45 pm
I recently watched a you tube video, quite interesting in its own right, but shows an IP football market and how poorly managed it was by the data providers. If you watch from 2.00 minutes on, you'll see what happens.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tENm5oTYR4Q
That's basically down to sloppy traders not watching a feed and the VAR coming into play disallowing the goal. It'll be interesting to see how Betfair approach the World Cup games, whether they'll be over cautious or let the markets play out so they don't lose out on comms from matched bets.
Ah yes..VAR.. Presents an opportunity in the World Cup for sure, if this video is anything to go by!
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Kafkaesque
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BetScalper wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 7:03 pm
spreadbetting wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 6:38 pm
BetScalper wrote:
Thu May 31, 2018 6:24 pm
Don't know why people are that shocked.

Now PaddyPower are involved (bookmakers) wasn't it obvious they would push for a sports book and slowly but surely dump the exchange by making it unattractive over time.

I have noticed the adverts about betfair where you can bet against each other with your own odds seemed to have stopped.

In 5 years time it will be the PaddyPower/Betfair sports book only, me thinks. They may allow laying but it will be totally different to Betfair now.

I don't know, just my thoughts on the subject....

People have been predicting the demise of betting exchanges for as long as I can remember but they're still here. If PP/Betfair dumped the exchange someone else would pick up baton, they went from nothing to a Billion £ company so it's not as if there isn't money in the exchange idea.

Many of us were around in the early days with exchanges like flutter, play2match etc and they had a fraction of the liquidity exhcanges have now. You could make a decent living back then and I'd imagine as long as you adapt you'll be able to make a decent living from exchanges for a long time to come.
I totally agree...

Personally I don't know what all the fuss is about. I don't trade any market unless there is > 100k matched before I even think about entering. And that means when it comes to football you don't need to worry about it not going in play etc.

It seems people are trying to bet on obscure games where, generally there is no interest from a liquidity point of view.
Specifically there's an issue with 10-20 % of MLS matches, just as an example. That's not obscure markets with no interest. They are 50k+ markets.

Even beyond specific examples, then just because it doesn't effect where you trade/where you deem people should be trading, doesn't make it a non-issue by default. It effects less than 1 % of markets, I actually trade. That doesn't stop me being concerned where it will lead.

Clearly, there's likely to be a breaking point in terms of how big the markets can be, before it doesn't make sense anymore for BF to try to cut cost corners and/or to try to lead people to the sportsbook. However, if they get away with it at a certain level of markets with no (exchange) customer reaction and positive net result on the bottom line, they'll keep trying for bigger markets. Standing off and claiming it doesn't effect you, because it doesn't yet is a dangerous position and a bit of a trading-version light Niemoller-moment.

Just today they had to suspend the Australia vs Czech Rep match 90 minutes before kickoff and void all bets. Not a huge market, but not exactly a tiny one either. The service provider had missed that the match was being played on neutral ground in Austria.
spreadbetting
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I don't think it's a case of BEtfair trying to direct people to the sportsbook, the sportsbook will be using exactly the same service provider for their market data too. It's basically down to the fact for some matches the data provided is unreliable because there's simply no real call for it. The service providers most likely supply data to all the sportsbooks, especially for the smaller games, so I'd guess they've pretty much a monopoly and no competition. I remember seeing jobs advertised for them in the past and for those games it's little more than a free ticket on offer for the match at lower leagues with only one person covering the game. If they can't be bothered to turn up , go for a slash etc the feed basically gets suspended.
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