As a punter who focuses primarily on Rugby Betting I have at least had New Zealand, Australian and European competitions to wager on over the past few weeks. I must say though that I haven’t really go into it and aside from following some of the shrewd punters on the Goodforthegame Forum I haven’t really got involved.

That changed this weekend with the start of the local season and Super Fan Saturday that took place at Loftus with a double header featuring the Bulls against the Sharks and the Lions against the Stormers.

In the opening game I was strong on the Bulls to win the match and put this up as my best bet in our weekly newsletter which goes out every Friday morning.

The Bulls are under new coach, Jake White and I particularly liked the pack that they selected for the match and indeed it was the Bulls who came out firing, racing into a 28-0 lead and this was one of those bets that arrived without giving a single grey hair. I had also bet over 52 points would be scored in the game and the profits were duly banked. Heading into the second match I was full of confidence and eager to fire with some big bets.

Earlier in the week I actually fancied the Lions to beast the handicap of (+4.5), but as the game approached I found myself leaning towards the Stormers and ended up backing them to win by 5 points or more. What was also interesting was that the Total Points Line was 57.5, a few points higher than the previous game and no doubt based on the fact that the Bulls v Sharks game had been so high scoring.

I could see there was a fair amount of dew about at Loftus and the Stormers are not a side that generally run away with things, but on the other hand they do have a strong defense. I hit both of my bets on this match and it leaves me very enthusiastic about the local season which lies ahead.

To cap a great weekend I also hit a treble in Europe where I took Racing, Exeter and Toulon to win their matches. There was an odd nervous moment, but the treble arrived fairly comfortably and with my betting accounts bolstered I am looking forward to the weekend ahead.

Twitter: @BrentGraham.

This article was written for the CitiGaming supplement of the Citizen Newspaper and was published on the 1 October 2020.

Brent Graham is a blogger on www.goodforthegame.co.za and sends a free weekly e-mail list just CLICK HERE to register