Football Site Project

On this web-page are all the details you need to know at this time. 

In my opinion these should  be enough for you to make a decision that this project is for you (you would like to join) or it is not for you (you are not interested).

I am looking for 14 good handicappers / bettors to start together a "Football (Soccer) Service Site".

The only conditions besides those below are is to be at least 22 years old, and to write/understand written English good enough so we can communicate.

Here are the 14 handicappers / bettors and their role on this site:

A. 2 handicappers, must be both resident in England.

They will have tips (picks/plays) only as detailed below on:

• England Premier League and Championship matches

• All matches played in Cup competitions (inside and outside of England) by all Premier League and Championship teams

• All friendly matches played by all Premier League and Championship teams (inside and outside of England)

• All official and friendly matches played by the England national team and the England U21 national team

B. 2 handicappers, must be both resident in Spain. 

They will have tips only as detailed below on:

• Spain LaLiga and LaLiga2 matches

• All matches played in Cup competitions (inside and outside of Spain) by all LaLiga and LaLiga2 teams

• All friendly matches played by all LaLiga and LaLiga2 teams (inside and outside of Spain)

• All official and friendly matches played by the Spain national team and the Spain U21 national team

C. 2 handicappers, must be both resident in Germany. 

They will have tips only as detailed below on:

• Germany Bundesliga and 2. Bundesliga matches

• All matches played in Cup competitions (inside and outside of Germany) by all Bundesliga and 2. Bundesliga teams

• All friendly matches played by all Bundesliga and 2. Bundesliga teams (inside and outside of Germany)

• All official and friendly matches played by the Germany national team and the Germany U21 national team

D. 2 handicappers, must be both resident in Italy. 

They will have tips only as detailed below on:

• Italy Serie A and Serie B matches

• All matches played in Cup competitions (inside and outside of Italy) by all Serie A and Serie B teams

• All friendly matches played by all Serie A and Serie B teams (inside and outside of Italy)

• All official and friendly matches played by the Italy national team and the Italy U21 national team

E. 2 handicappers, must be both resident in France. 

They will have tips only as detailed below on:

• France Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 matches

• All matches played in Cup competitions (inside and outside of France) by all Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 teams

• All friendly matches played by all Ligue 1 and Ligue 2 teams (inside and outside of France)

• All official and friendly matches played by the France national team and the France U21 national team

F. 1 handicapper, must be resident in either Netherlands or Belgium. 

He will have tips only as detailed below on:

• Netherlands Eredivisie + Eerste Divisie  and Belgium Jupiler Pro League + Challenger Pro League matches

• All matches played in Cup competitions (inside and outside of Netherlands and Belgium) by all Eredivisie + Eerste Divisie and Jupiler Pro League + Challenger Pro League teams

• All friendly matches played by all Eredivisie + Eerste Divisie and Jupiler Pro League + Challenger Pro League teams (inside and outside of Netherlands and Belgium)

• All official and friendly matches played by the Netherlands and Belgium national teams and the Netherlands U21 and Belgium U21 national teams

G. 1 handicapper, must be resident in either Austria or Switzerland. 

He will have tips only as detailed below on:

• Austria Bundesliga + 2. Liga  and Switzerland Super League + Challenge League matches

• All matches played in Cup competitions (inside and outside of Austria and Switzerland) by all Bundesliga + 2. Liga and  Super League + Challenge League teams

• All friendly matches played by all Bundesliga + 2. Liga and Super League + Challenge League teams (inside and outside of Austria and Switzerland)

• All official and friendly matches played by the Austria and Switzerland national teams and the  Austria U21 and Switzerland U21 national teams

H. 1 handicapper, must be resident in any of Denmark, Sweden or Norway. 

He will have tips only as detailed below on:

• Denmark Superliga + 1st Division and Sweden Allsvenskan + Superettan and Norway Eliteserien + OBOS-ligaen matches

• All matches played in Cup competitions (inside and outside of Denmark, Sweden and Norway) by all Superliga + 1st Division, Allsvenskan + Superettan and Eliteserien + OBOS-ligaen teams

• All friendly matches played by all Superliga + 1st Division, Allsvenskan + Superettan and Eliteserien + OBOS-ligaen teams (inside and outside of Denmark, Sweden and Norway)

• All official and friendly matches played by the Denmark, Sweden and Norway national teams and the Denmark U21, Sweden U21 and Norway U21 national teams

I. 1 handicapper, must be resident in any of Turkey, Greece or Croatia. 

He will have tips only as detailed below on:

•  Turkey Super Lig + 1. Lig, Greece Super League, and Croatia HNL matches

• All matches played in Cup competitions (inside and outside of Turkey, Greece and Croatia) by all Super Lig + 1. Lig, Super League and HNL teams

• All friendly matches played by all Super Lig + 1. Lig, Super League and HNL teams (inside and outside of Turkey, Greece and Croatia)

• All official and friendly matches played by the Turkey, Greece and Croatia national teams and the Turkey U21, Greece U21 and Croatia U21 national teams

Exclusively when there are no matches in any week (Monday - Sunday) for any of the teams they are following anyone can have tips on:

• Any of the teams followed by anybody else on the site. 

• Just in the period of 16 May - 31 August: all official (not friendly) matches played in the Brazil Serie A + Serie B, Argentina Liga Profesional, Chile Primera Division, Colombia Primera A, Mexico Liga MX, USA/Canada MLS, Finland Veikkausliiga and Ireland Premier Division, and all the official Cup matches played by all the teams which are in these leagues (inside or outside their respective countries), and all the official and friendly matches played by the national teams of Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Mexico, United States, Canada, Finland, Ireland. 

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Conditions and time-schedule for all tips

A. Types of wagers allowed:

• "1" "X" or "2" (home win, draw, away win)

• Asian Handicap (plus or minus a number of goals)

• Total Goals (Over or Under)

• Both Teams To Score - BTTS (Yes or No)

• Double Chance (1X, 12 or X2)

B. All tips must be straight wagers or two-fold* accumulators (parlays).                             

* These accumulators are composed from maximum 2 straight wagers.

C. All tips must be just on full time matches (90 minutes + added extra time).

D. Odds allowed:

• All odds must be between minimum 1.50 - maximum 3.00 for straight tips.

• All odds must be between minimum 1.30 - maximum 2.00 for the component straight wagers of the accumulator tips.

• All odds shown must be the "average odds at all bookmakers", conform the "Oddsportal" web-site. These odds should be those valid at "Oddsportal" maximum 3 minutes before the respective tip was posted (released).

E. Money management allowed:

Every handicapper must use a fixed risk money management, in which all tips must be wagered with risking the same % of bankroll (same "unit") on all straight wagers and the same % of bankroll (same "unit") on all accumulators.

In other words:

• If any handicapper has always just straight tips, they must have always the same % of bankroll (same "unit") risked on all these tips

• If any handicapper has straight tips and also accumulators, they can have always the same % of bankroll (same "unit") risked on all these tips, or one kind of % of bankroll ("unit") risked on all straight tips and another kind of of % of bankroll ("unit") risked on all accumulators.

Percents (%) of bankroll or "units" allowed for both straight tips and accumulators: 1, 1.5, 2, 2.5, 3, 4 and 5 (Total bankroll = 100% / 100 "units").

F. Time schedule for all tips:

For all tips the time of match starts used is the Central European Time (CET), and should be conform the "Oddsportal" web-site. CET is the official time in Berlin, Paris, Roma, Madrid, Amsterdam, Stockholm, Vienna, Budapest, etc.

A "day" is considered the time period of the match official starts between 1:00 CET (the same day) - 4:35 CET (the next day).

• For any day in which the match official start is between 1:00 CET - 22:35 CET, all tips must be posted between 19:00 CET (the day before) - 10:00 CET (the same day).

• For any day in which the match official start is between 22:45 CET - 4:35 CET (the next day), all tips must be posted between 7:00 CET (the same day) - 17:00 CET (the same day).

F. Number of tips allowed:

• For any "day" there can be maximum 4 tips from any handicapper. 

• One accumulator counts as a single tip. 

So for any day there can be 4 straight tips, 4 accumulators, 3 straight tips and 1 accumulator, 2 straight tips and 2 accumulators, or 1 straight tip and 3 accumulators.

• On a single match there can maximum 2 straight tips, of any wager types allowed. Both of these straight tips can be part of 2 different accumulators too, valid for the same "day". 

• Accumulators can be composed from 2 straight combined wagers on the same match, only if none of these tips are given as separate straight wagers.

• For any week (Monday - Sunday) there can be maximum 16 tips from any handicapper. 

It is a good practice to check in advance the schedule of matches for the week ahead and see what match-up do you like (the most), to plan in advance your tips.

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Money Matters

A. Handicapper's participation fee:

For all participant handicappers there will be a site participation fee of US$ 5.00 per any calendar month.

• This participation fee will be payable through PayPal, always in the last 7 calendar days of any calendar month prior to any calendar month for which the fee is valid for.

• This participation fee is what is needed to be received through PayPal. So either you are using the calculation on your side of what is needed to be sent to be received this amount, or you simply send US$ 5.56, which will cover the maximum expected PayPal fees.

• The participation fee will be recalculated every year, valid first time for the month of August of any year. The calculation will be based on the official value of the inflation in the period of August - July of the last year.

• For the first period of time when we will start the site, the first payment of the participation fee will cover between minimum 5 weeks (35 days) and maximum 8 weeks (56 days), depending on the first official day's position in the first calendar month and other factors.

• After minimum 3 months of running the site, it will be considered a change to a "2 months paid for" plan, where handicappers will have a participation fee of US$ 10.00, valid for any 2 consecutive calendar months.

Why is needed a participation fee?

Though it is a very insignificant amount of money, by having such fee, it is a strong psychological factor in encouraging just serious people to become site handicappers and to keep on their business-like activity each month. These are by far the most important reasons to have any kind of participation fee.

Secondarily, it is one surefire method to determine if the residence of a handicapper is in the country it should be (conform the teams/competitions to be followed), by seeing their country in the PayPal payment interface upon receiving a payment.

Important note:

If you came this far in reading this presentation, but you may think that I am doing all this setup because I am after your measly US$ 5.00 each month (in other words to scam you out of $5.00), please leave right now, and never come back!

A. The distribution of the site's income:

You can see in the table above how the total income of the site will be divided.

SUBSCRIPTIONS = the total amount paid through subscription fees by all site customers in a calendar month, in US$

HANDICAPPERS = the total amount paid to handicappers in the next calendar month

ADMIN = the total amount left over to the site Admin in the next calendar month

All these projections are made using the following data:

• The monthly subscription fee for the site customers will be US$ 44.50 to start with (this value will be raised once a year, conform official inflation data for the previous year)

• The maximum number of site customers will be capped to 300 in any time period (the reason for this is that no higher number can be handled correctly by a single person - the site Admin)

Here are 3 examples: 

• In case if "SUBSCRIPTIONS" = US$ 3,000:

a. The handicappers will get paid US$ 2,000 (this is 2/3 A), and 

b. The left over to the site Admin will be US$ 1,000.

• In case if "SUBSCRIPTIONS" = US$ 6,700:

a. The handicappers will get paid US$ 4,563.46 [2/3 A + 71% (C-B) = 2/3 * 4,450 + 0.71 * (6,700-4,451) = 2,966.67 + +0.71*2,249 = 2,966.67 + 1,596.79], and 

b. The left over to the site Admin will be US$ 1,933.54.

• In case if "SUBSCRIPTIONS" = US$ 11,200: 

a. The handicappers will get paid US$ 7,849.71 [2/3 A + 71% (C-B) + 75% (E-D) = 2/3 * 4,450 + 0.71 * (8,900-4,451) + 0.75 * (11,200-8,901) = 2,966.67 + 0.71 * 4,449 + 0.75 * 2,299 = 2,966.67 + 3,158.79 +1,724.25], and 

b. The left over to the site Admin will be US$ 3,350.29.

In conclusion, at maximum 300 site customers in a calendar month, which is the goal target, the next calendar month the handicappers will get paid US$ 9,462.21, and the left over to the site Admin will be US$ 3,887.79.

In the future we can go higher than 300 site customers, but not in the first year of the site's existence. In this case probably a paid employee must be hired in order to deal just with the customer service / subscription payment issues, and the project must be registered as a company - if so, it will be done in the United States. 

Until the project has no more than 300 customers, we can function very well without being registered as a company. In this situation everyone involved (handicappers and Admin) will be responsible for paying taxes according to the legislation of their country of residence on any income from the site.

How the total payment towards the handicappers will be divided among the handicappers? 

A "final ranking of handicappers" according to their performance in the respective month will be used. Below is the proposed schema of this final ranking. 

This schema can be modified regarding the percentages to each handicapper and also regarding the number of handicappers (to increase it to 6, 7 or 8). These matters will be discussed and fixed finally by having the input and accord of all 14 handicappers.

The "final ranking  of handicappers" in any calendar month will be determined by the ranking of the pure result in bankroll gain in that month (in "units") and also by the ranking by the vote of all handicappers (they will not have the right to vote for themselves) - this second method is needed because handicappers may use different size of units in their money managements.

In case if having 5 positions (as shown in the table), in both the pure result ranking and the decided by voting ranking will be given 5, 4, 3, 2 and 1 points (in order of best to worst) and then the two point systems will be added. In case if in the final ranking 2 (or even 3) positions will come out with equal points, the % to all these ranks will be equal (will be the average of the 2 or 3 rankings).

All this explanation may seem not that clear, but it's the best way I can make it now. The most important is that the distribution among the handicappers to happen in the best way possible to reflect their handicapping evolution (which will be the main reason for site customers to make subscriptions), and all participant handicappers to agree on how the ranking is established.

All payments towards the handicappers for any calendar month's activity will need to be paid by the site Admin latest by the 8th day of the next calendar month.

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The Setup of The Site

We will have a setup based on a regular website plus a discussion forum (PHPBB build), or plus a Google group, or plus a combination of both a forum and a group.

No matter which setup we will decide to use finally, it is essential for every tip released by any handicapper to be always proofed.

A Google Group is ideal to have, because it provides the 100% not possible to be tampered with proof of all work of the handicappers. Everything posted in a Google group has a timestamp, and can not be edited (altered) later on even by the group's owner. With this setup every handicapper will have their own thread, in which only they will post their own tips. Anyone can sign-up to a Google group, even without having a Google Mail address, or can be signed-up by the group's owner. It is easy for the group's owner to let having a Group membership for only those customers, who have a valid site subscription.

Another great advantage of a Google group is that by looking at the number of all group members, the handicappers can know how many site clients/subscribers exist at any time.

A discussion forum is ideal to have because besides every handicapper having his own tips thread, the site customers with valid subscription can subscribe only to the thread(s) they wish to follow (the handicappers they wish to follow). The problem having just a forum is that the forum Admin can edit (alter) any posts by anybody, and from the Admin's panel things can be set up so that these edits are without any trace. So having just a forum is not a 100% proof for the work of the handicappers.

At this time my opinion is that we should go with a forum + a group. Handicappers first post any tip in the forum's own threads and then immediately, using "copy+paste", post the same tip in the group. This kind of double posting will be very easy and takes just a little more time than posting in a single place.

The regular website will contain all the explanation needed on how everything works, the presentation of handicappers (bio for those who would like to have a bio), periodically updated general info about each handicapper's performance lately, links to the handicappers' threads in the forum and (or) links to the group and of course every info related to subscription.

   We will decide before start what kind of setup we will use by common agreement.

I need to mention that I have a lots of experience running PHPBB forums as Admin, and also with Google Groups. I have also designed several websites for others and myself, though I am just self-thought in website design (HTML, CSS, PHP, etc.), so I will do the design for our website.

Besides posting their tips, the handicappers will be required to keep accurate daily and overall records of their work. After any day has ended (before posting tips for any new day) they will need to post after the last post of the ended day the balance of that day (Won - Lost - Pushed / + or - "units") and also to refresh with these results their overall records. The Admin will check these records for any errors. Handicappers who try to better/falsify their real records in the long run, will be deleted from the site.

The Admin will do all the site clients' managing work (customer service), the handling of all incoming and outgoing payments towards the site, will verify the correctness of the handicappers' posted tips, will advertise about the project by having open threads in various sports forums (we should be present in at least 10 forums, which allow sports service site advertisement/threads - at least 4-6 big, worldwide forums and at least 5-6 smaller, national forums specifically in the countries there are tips for). 

Because presence in forums will be essential to getting site customers, in every existing thread the Admin will make 1 post each day. Ideal would be that for each thread to have minimum 2 posts daily (14 in a week) for better viewership, so for this the help from the handicappers will be needed. By common agreement, we will work out some kind of program/schedule according to which every handicapper should have a minimum number of posts in total in all places where we will have open threads. Handicappers will be instructed about the short content they should post in these places - these should be usually about their own record, what they are tipping about in that day, etc.

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Reasons For Handicappers To Participate?

If you got this far reading, you may ask what is the advantage to participate as a handicapper, if will not get paid any amounts from the site's income, by not being ranked among those who will benefit from this, or the site will have for many months a too small number of subscriber clients, so even if being part of those who will get payments because of their rankings, these amounts will be too small to be considered?

Besides being rewarded directly for their successful activity, all handicappers will have access all the time to all other handicappers' tips. 

At first, this access of course gives the opportunity to follow any other handicappers who are doing well, and by this all handicappers can increase their monthly betting bankrolls without losing any more time by handicapping matches they were not considering for their portfolio. 

Secondly, this access it's an automatic savings of the site's subscription fee for all participant handicappers. The proposed subscription fee being US$45.00 for a month for the first year, this savings is 45.00 - max. 5.56 (this is the site participation fee for handicappers) = min. US$ 39.44.

Besides all these, all handicappers will have a nicely organized structure through which to keep all their work saved and exposed for a lots of eyes to see. 

It is a win-win situation for all participant handicappers.

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Final Thoughts

As the future Admin of this project, I have been thinking about something like this for at least 3 years, but until now I had no physical time to start it. 

I have a lots of experience in sports betting, not just football (soccer) betting, and I have been part of several sports services as a handicapper, also I have been running several "sports service" type sites projects since 2007 by myself, or with others. I honestly think that the setup presented above should work well, and the success of this project depends just on the quality of handicappers who will join.

All in all, even if we will not succeed as planned, nobody will have anything to lose except some of their time they will put into this project. Yes, it is true that "time is money".

In case of a failure in the long run, I, the Admin, will have the most to lose by far, considering the time and effort I am willing to put into the success of this project.

I hope you have read carefully and have understood everything on this webpage, and you like what you see! 

Les, 

Project Admin

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If you have a question or questions about anything presented here not being clear to you, or about something not discussed, please ask by completing the form below. I will try to reply ASAP. 

My reply will come from: "Tipster Project" <tipsterproject [at] live.com> 

All data entered in the form above will be kept secure, and will be never shared with anyone without the written consent of the person who completed the form.

If you would like to become part of this project as a handicapper, please complete the form below. 

My reply will come from: "Tipster Project" <tipsterproject [at] live.com> 

All data entered in the form above will be kept secure, and will be never shared with anyone without the written consent of the person who completed the form.

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