Almost the end of the first week of the 2026 season. I don’t include the United Cup. Did I mention that?

New Year’s Eve was quieter than expected. My wife was working New Year’s Day so went to bed around 7:30. The fireworks had started at 5pm so myself and the dogs were on the rug. I had got one of those firework jackets for Molly. They are supposed to calm the dog by “hugging” them. I got one for Charlie too but it was too tight on his fat arse. He just had a snood on to try to block some of the noise. I don’t think it does block the noise but distracts him a little. I was concentrating on Charlie. He will bark at the noise of fireworks (also the doorbell, kids in the street, cats, fox calls etc etc) and his barking stresses Molly.

So he was on his side next to me having his betting scratched. It’s the first time I have tried this to help with fireworks. I usually just try to calm him down if he reacts. He loves a belly rub and will come and stare at me on an evening. “What do you want? A wee? Water? Treat?”. No reaction. “Want a belly rub?”. He flops down on his side with his leg in the air. So throughout most of the evening we watched TV. He barely reacted. The real surprise was that even when big bangs were going off, Molly slept. She usually lies down and trebles when loud noises are going off.

In fact from midnight until 1 am when most of the fireworks ended, they were both asleep!

The first couple of weeks of the season can be tricky ones to predict. The Australian Open is just round the corner so any player who is carrying a strain or minor injury isn’t going to risk missing the Major. At this time of year, I tend to get up early to trade rather than staying up all night. I used to pull full night shifts. I can manage the occasion full nighter (my wife may disagree), but I’m like a zombie after a couple. I’m not 25 anymore!

After the first night of matches, I opened my phone to check some of the results. I was just hoping that I hadn’t got them all wrong! In fact, from the matches that had been played at that time, most of them had gone more or less as expected. The week didn’t quite continue the same way but the surprises were only a little more frequent than a normal mid season week.

We dodged most of the snow this week. it started snowing at around 6 pm on Thursday after raining for most of the day. Apparently, it was still snowing at 11 pm. By the morning, it was raining again and most of the snow was gone from the road. By the afternoon, all the snow had melted.

I am running a trial/experiment trying to find a selection process that can be automated for straight bets. I am looking at combinations of stats to see which give the best results. The first few days were challenging. The process was giving decent picks but then I had to find a value bet on that player. I went mostly with handicaps. The last few days have renewed my dislike for handicap bets!

If I am putting money on a player, I want them to have the same goal as I do, which is for them to win. A player doesn’t really care if they take a set with a single break or with a double break but that difference affects a handicap bet. It doesn’t help that on Betfair, only one handicap option had any money in the market. So, you might want to take the -3.5 games bet but all the money is on -2.5 games.

So, having gone through the results so far, I have seen a combo of 4 stats that only has one loss so far. To get the value, I will use Betfair “Keep” bets so the bet can be placed pre match and left to run. I’ll see how that goes. The first one was this morning. Medvedev at 1.70. The price hit when he went a break down to Michelsen. As I write this, he is 5-3 up in the first set. Plenty of time for it to go wrong.

Catch you later.