Back in 1966, an Englishman named Norman Leigh took twelve individuals into an adventure that involved playing a little known roulette system against the French Casinos. They ended up winning a very substantial amount of money which when converted to today’s money equates to nearly a million pounds. Many people have dubbed Leigh a con man in that he either duped twelve individuals into putting their own money at risk or he fabricated the whole story or parts of it.

I suppose that we will never know now but I would like to think that he did it. Of course there is also a third possibility here and that is that Leigh may have firmly believed in his own mind the mathematical validity of what it was that he was doing. The betting system that he was using was called the Reverse LaBouchere and the vast majority of people who play roulette today would not have heard of this system or even how it works for that matter.

The overwhelming majority of punters have only ever heard or use the Martingale so it is little surprise that back in 1966 when people were far more in the dark with regards gambling that all these people including Norman Leigh may have believed in their own minds that this system was workable.

Of course with all gambling systems then we have the issue of trial size. Norman Leigh and his team only played for a total of two weeks and this is nowhere near long enough for any system to prove itself or for the casino house edge to show itself which is a better way of putting it. Back when I worked in gaming, I knew several system players both on roulette and blackjack who remained ahead of the casino for very long periods of time and far longer than two weeks.

So in my opinion, Leigh and his team were nothing more than lucky and had they played on then they would surely have suffered inevitable losses that would have led to the total wipe out of their bankroll. It was fortunate for them and less so for the casino and the authorities that they were stopped from playing. Today the casino in question certainly would not have prevented the players from playing and this is proof enough of how this system cannot possibly work in the long term.

But then again this is something that we all know and the casinos know only too well. There are no mathematical systems known to man that can or have ever overcome the house edge on roulette. Some of the lesser known systems can and are very intricately put together and it is this that can seduce the novice roulette player into thinking that they can succeed in the long term. Actually I found Norman Leigh’s book to be inspirational for my own blackjack team but as for finding a way to beat the casinos then I have to say….sorry but no.