Gambling and betting is by far one of the biggest entertainment industries in the world, bringing billions upon billions in revenue every single year, even during recessions and other bad years. Millions of people are betting money on blackjack, roulette, football and horse races every single day, with the hopes of the last bet being the one that makes them rich, or at least gets them a nice sum to add to what they’ve already got. Europe has the distinct advantage of being the continent in which gambling and betting is legal in most region – while large parts of Asia and America have outlawed these practices, they still remain legal in most of Europe, and as such there’s a whole lot more gamblers in the region than there are in the East and West. Most people go to a casino mostly to have fun, not particularly relying on their lucky star, and while luck will always remain a part of these games, what if I told you there was a way to use relatively simple strategies in order to maximize your winnings?

Do gambling strategies actually make a difference?

Yes, they do! You can ask any big-name gambler or bettor, and they all agree that all casinos employ a system that can be beaten relatively easily – most people just never bother to try and learn how, or lack the financial opportunity to take the risk. Casino experts like John Scarne, famous card counters like Kevin Lewis and mentalists such as Derren Brown have all developed and used various strategies in order to beat the casino at their own game, and despite the fact that all three are extremely intelligent men, they all agree that you don’t have to be a genius to learn a skill like card counting – it just takes a lot of patience, training and mental practice, as well as the right resources. Make no mistake – if you put your mind to it, you will be able to learn and master the techniques you’d win to make it big while playing casino!

Are the strategies complicated?

Some are, and some are not. Really, the more complex a strategy is, the higher you can expect your earnings to be – if you could just snap your fingers and then win millions at blackjack, then everybody would be doing it and there would be no point in casinos in general! They’d be bankrupt within a week! Still, while card counting can take months to learn and years to perfect, there are some strategies that are literally so simple that you’ll be able to employ them effectively and increase your winnings as soon as you read this! For example:

• Martingale – this betting system is actually really great for any quick games that have a definite win-or-lose state. The traditional example (which I’ll also give) uses a coin toss, but the system can be easily applied to blackjack and roulette. Imagine, for the sake of argument, that someone has challenged you to a game where you can bet whatever you’d like, and then the person will toss a coin. If it lands on heads, he’ll double your bet, but if it lands on tails he’ll take it. From there, the way to absolutely ensure that you’ll leave with more money than you started with is to simply double your bet with each loss. Say that, for example, your first bet is €2, and you lose. Your next bet is €4, which you also lose. Your third bet is €8, which you win, meaning that you now have €16 even though you only lost €6. Even without counting the €8 for the last bet, that’s still a profit of €2, which may not seem like much, but imagine what would happen if you put a couple of zeroes at the end. The only negative to this method is that it implies that the gambler’s funds are infinite, which in real life is clearly impossible, so unless you have brought enough money with you the Martingale system might bankrupt you. But if money is no issue, then it’s a surefire way to win even if you’re not very good at casino games.
• Labouchere – Another system that can be used for a good variety of games. It involves coming up with an amount of money that you wish to win (we’re talking pure profit here) – let’s say €50. You write down a list of numbers that, when combined, form that amount (for example 5, 10, 15, 20) and then bet the combined sum of your first and last number. If you win, you remove the numbers from the list and go again. If you lose, you add the amount you lost as a number on the bottom. Once there are no more numbers on the list, you stop playing and leave with the sum you wanted to win. It’s a very easy way to control your urges to bet more and more and limit the amount of money you gamble, while also giving you an almost surefire way to win. Just like Martingale, though, it also relies on the player possessing a virtually infinite amount of money, so once again you need to look out and make sure not to go bankrupt. Try writing smaller amounts in order to minimize the risk.