A fixed stake

A fixed stake

A bankroll is the money you have set aside for betting and are willing to lose. It should be separate from rent, food, and money you owe. If losing it would change how you live this month, it is too large.

A fixed stake means you bet the same unit each time. One unit might be one or two percent of that bankroll. The unit does not grow because you feel sure, and it does not grow because the last bet lost. The last result is not information about the size of the next stake.

Short prices tempt people to stake more, because the return looks small. Long prices tempt people to stake more, because a win would be large. Both moves break the record. You can no longer tell whether the selections were any good, because the money was doing the work instead of the choices.

Write the stake down before the match, at the price you are actually offered. A tip does not include your bookmaker's price. If the price has shortened past the chance you give the result, the right stake is zero. Skipping is part of the plan.

A losing week at a fixed unit is a smaller hole than a losing week of raised stakes. You will have losing weeks. Football results cluster. The unit exists so that a cluster does not empty the bankroll in one afternoon.

Do not borrow to replace a unit, and do not split the bankroll into a recovery bet. Chasing a loss with a bigger price or a bigger stake is how a small losing day becomes a bad month. The next bet is a new bet, at one unit, or it is no bet.

Review the bankroll on a calm day, not after the final whistle. If the bankroll has shrunk, the unit shrinks with it, because the unit is a share of what is left. If that share is no longer worth the bother, stop. Stopping is a successful use of a limit.