Some thoughts on attitude and mindset...

The sales profession is jam packed full of age old cliches and truisms, some of which are more relevant to life than others. Two, however, stick in my mind to the extent that I think they are valuable in everyday life and your approach to potentially risky environments such as trading football matches!

"It's your ATTITUDE rather than your APTITUDE that determines your ALTITUDE"

And....

"Proper Planning Prevents P*** Poor Performance" 

To translate both those sayings into a trading situation you could re-write number 1 as "Don't panic, Capt Manwaring!" and the second one to "Make sure you have an exit strategy if it goes tits up!"

I have, in the past, been extremely guilty of panicking and of not having an exit strategy! Trading when everything is going well is so easy. The men are sorted from the boys by their actions when a plan goes awry. Look no further than my rabbit in the headlights session a few posts ago for a prime example of this! What a whining useless 'boy' I was that night - even though it turned out well enough in the end!

We had an interesting discussion in the chat room the other night about scalping and peoples' attitude to risk. Personally I am far too tight to pay Mr Murdoch for a load of drossy TV and until and unless he lets me have a pure sports subscription it will stay that way. Most of my trading is, therefore, done either totally blind or by listening to a radio commentary or watching a poor quality stream which is usually at least a minute behind the action!

Most people in chat prefer to scalp games they are watching on Sky or terrestrial tv. The idea is that you enter a trade when the ball is 'safe' - out of play, in the goalie's arms or when someone is receiving medical attention. The exit is either a straight lay a couple of ticks lower, or you exit when there is a 'danger' moment. This all sounds an excellent plan and I know lots of people do this kind of scalping extremely successfully. However, ask yourself this question... Can a ball go from the 'keeper's arms into one of the two goals inside 16 seconds? The answer is yes - and the sixteen seconds is important because that is the in-play delay on submitting two bets.. and that's a best possible time because getting a bet placed AND getting it matched are ,as we know, two different things!

To my mind scalping is inherently dangerous - particularly if you are in a binary market - i.e. two outcomes, such as correct score or u2.5 with two goals already scored - you stand a real chance of getting caught for your full stakes..But, scalping can be greatly profitable - on its own or in reducing other reds, a tactic a lot of people use on the CS market. So my approach to scalping is twofold - in a binary market I go with small stakes, and look to green a back with a hedged lay 1 or at the most 2 ticks lower than the back. Evo is great for doing this - the lay is submitted as the back gets matched automatically - the trader need do nothing. In a non-binary market (e.g. U3.5 at less than 3 goals) I'll use higher stakes and look to lay in stages, building a green figure on the most likely outcome..

The mindset of a trader is a very interesting thing....in my opinion you need to be resolute in your choice of trade, and ruthless in your execution - if it looks like it's going wrong take decisive action and don't, whatever you do, look back! Another apt little truism is this one.... 'An opportunity going away from you always looks a lot bigger than one coming towards you..'

Finally, for those of you who are mathematically aware there are some fascinating discussions on the Racing Traders forum, mainly courtesy of a chap who goes by the monicker of 'Uncle Scrooge'. He talks of the difference between probability and frequency - an important concept to grasp when looking at entry and exit points. He also has plenty to say about poisson distribution and its relationship to probability and to ideas about money management. To be frank, a lot of it goes right over my head, but, US, if you're reading this (I've no idea who he is, btw!) it's massively interesting and thought provoking....