Fifty quid in our account. Twenty-five of mine: twenty five of Ben's. A new season ahead. So what to start on?
We've decided not to bet more than 10% of our pot on any one game, so that means we have a fiver to play with today.
PaddyPower, our bookmaker of choice, is offering what looks like an excellent deal. If Sergio Aguero, who scored 30 times last season, scores the first goal of the game today, PP will reimburese all losing bets on the first scorer and the actual game result.
Liking this a lot, we decide to back the returning, slimmed down anti-hero Carlos Tevez to score first at 6/1 with 2 quid.
Then we choose a score. City have a great attack, Chelsea have Torres, and we figure that at this point in the season the defences may not quite have settled in. We put £2 on a 3-2 win for City at an inviting 22/1.
We have £1 left. There's a decent looking 10/1 being offered on a 2-2 draw. As we don't back City to lose, whatever happens, we take that.
THE GAME
Against the odds, Torres scores first. Our bet on Tevez is dead, as is our insurance policy gift from PP. At HT, Chelsea lead 1-0. We need a 2-2 draw or a 3-2 win. Oh... and Chelsea are down to 10 men, the referee having rather harshly red-carded Ivanovic late in the first half.
Second half starts well. Yaya Toure smacks in a poor clearance for 1-1. Then Tevez works some magic across the face of the Chelsea defence and hammers home for 2-1. Within a couple more minutes Nasri has lashed home a rising cross from Kolarov and City are 3-1 up with half an hour left. We're thinking we should have taken 4-1. Maybe even 5-1. But then Pantilimon, deputising in goal for Joe Hart, fails to hold onto a perfectly claimable shot, and Bertrand brings it back to 3-2 with 10 minutes to go.
And so it ends. City hold on for the 3-2 win as Ben and I share the bittersweet anguish of all fan-gamblers: our hunger for more City goals dimmed by our desire to swell our pot.
In the end, the 3-2 win fortuitously plumped for at 22/1 means we finish the day £44 up and £3 down, with our account now standing at £91.
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