Second Test

A buy of England first innings runs in the second Test would have brought in a healthy profit, as the home side, and Kevin Pietersen in particular, piled them on.

The first test was interesting for our punting, and what I propose to do now is to highlight how flexible we must be when trading cricket and how quickly our opinions, sentiments and therefore positions can change.

Take last Friday – the second day. My initial update was to hope England scored well which would drag the draw price into the 2.xxx areas and allow us a cheap lay of the draw with three days to play.

However, as England scored well I became concerned at the placidity of the pitch and the inclemnent weather forecast so by the end of Friday I had swung completely around and stated that with one West Indian partnership this match would be a draw. The price was between 3.25 and 3.5 on betfair and my view remained steadfast for a draw throughout the rest of the match.

It was a draw and we won handsomely on the trading.

We took a hit on the second morning on the spreads. West Indies dropped two sitters and umpire Asad Raud gave Collingwood a life.

But we took our hit and got out of the trade leaving us the rest of the match to trade on the exchanges.

All my ideas before the Test and during the early part had changed completely by Friday evening, and we reacted immediately and managed to salvage our positions and call the game correctly.

If we had stuck to our initial plans, we would have lost plenty. So we must be attuned to the game as how it is played and be flexible in our thinking and punting.

England v West Indies, Second Test, Friday

Leeds is such a funny place to play cricket. Get some cloud and the ball swings and seams around, but a bit of sun overhead and it flattens out into a batting paradise. Spread punters bear that in mind.

Now my initial thoughts are plenty of sun should make batting easy again for both sides. However, I don’t want to back the draw early when we will have plenty of opportunities during the match.

I want a exhaustive weather report which suggests sun for at least the rest of this week but weakens come the weekend. Then some acceptance that West Indies are not the rollovers many (including me) thought.

How do we trade this now?

If sun is shining on Friday morning I am a buyer of runs. As for trading I will wait for the match to start.