The hardest thing about trading on Betfair is remembering that you are now a trader and not a gambler!

I lost 10% of my bank last week because I let my emotions get the better of me. First up was the diabolical performance by Liverpool FC in the Europa cup to SC Braga.

That’s the same SC Braga that lost 0-6 to Arsenal whilst getting dumped out of the Champions league earlier in the season.

I laid the draw but instead of bailing out once the price hit evens I let it ride convinced the Anfield roar would kick in at some point and we would see one of those famous European nights the scousers are forever telling us all about.

The goal never came and I waived good bye to my cash…..Bye Bye Cash

Second disaster was a great chance to recover from my losses but turned out to be another lesson. Federer was a set down but 0-40 up in the first game of the 2nd set so expecting him to take 1 of the 3 break points I backed him. Sure enough he broke and his price plummeted. I was just about to trade out when he went 15-0 up in his service game. That’s when the greedy gremlins kicked in and I started anticipating the further drop in price when he goes 2 games up in the set.

He lost his serve game before I could get out and the chance had gone.

Lesson learnt….I hope!

I’ve started using the stop loss feature built into Bet Angel, my software tool of choice when trading to take some of the emotion out of the process. I also now avoid any teams I might have an emototional tie to as its hard screaming for a goal when its in your teams penalty area

These aren’t the only mistakes I’ve made in my first few months as a full time trader and as long as I learn from them then I don’t mind.

Just about everything I have read on sports trading includes a heavy selection on how to get into the right mindset, how to expect and deal with losses etc. and I’m beginning to realise just how important this side to the job is because if you can’t deal with the losses you’ll end up never going for the winners.

Spent the morning double checking my picks for the days football only to find the Betfair servers went down just before the kick off.

I’m just glad I didn’t get on earlier in the day as I planned to lay the draw for the QPR v Crystal Palace game and for a time it went 1-1 so I would not have been happy not getting the chance to trade out although I would probably have hung back expecting QPR to go on and score another.

The site kept coming back online but then when you tried to get on something the ‘we are having unexpected problems’ message would flash back up.

Not sure if this is anything to do with them going offshore this week. I know the business is now based in Gibralter but does that mean they moved the hardware? Probably not. Still, strange how they move and then the first busy day causes a crash.

Lets hope its sorted and ready to go for Cheltenham next week!

The form book said Swansea would bounce back with a comfortable win against Watford. Unfortunately Watford didn’t read the script!

I laid the draw at 4.1 with my regular stake of £30 but was out for the night and this was the first time I had traded on a match via my iphone.

The game kept getting suspended but when it came back online the odds would hardly move. It was frustrating not knowing what was happening and I don’t know if I would trade via the iphone again. You really need to know if someone has been carded, a penalty has been given etc.

Anyway, eventually Swansea scored and I decided to hang on and see if they could get another.

Well into the second half the price for the draw started to come back in so I got out at 7.0 and just in time as Watford equalised soon after.

I ended up with a £2 loss

I fancied plenty of goals in this game even with Blackpool missing their two star players. Although the price for a draw was a little out of my comfort zone I laid £30 at 6.5 and never looked in any danger.

I backed the draw once it reached 60.0 with a £3 bet to cover my liability but by that time the draw was never on the cards.

Profit was £27 less the Betfair commission.

It would be nice if all football trades went this way!