Football Betting Strategies
If you plan on betting long-term with a bookmaker, we advise implementing some football betting strategies. Betting systems can help ensure you don’t lose money by placing random bets and not tracking your stakes and profit/loss margin. It’s important to note that betting strategies do not guarantee wins. They are best used to help you manage your gambling and increase your chances of winning, while also reducing the house edge over punters. Here, we’ll tell you everything you need to know about the best football betting strategies. So, if you want to know more about the most effective strategies for betting on football, keep reading.
Use the Welcome Bonus Wisely
One of the quickest and easiest strategies that you can employ is taking advantage of welcome bonuses at sports betting sites. You’ll find that almost all bookies have a new customer bonus as a way of enticing punters to join them, this is something that all bettors should use to their advantage.
However, just getting the bonus isn’t enough, you need to make sure that you use the free bet in the best possible way. That’s where an effective betting strategy comes into play. One of the more useful ways that you can take advantage of a welcome bonus is by using it to back a banker.
While backing an odds on favourite isn’t a guaranteed winning system, it does offer you the chance to quickly turn a free bet into real cash. The key is to look for value and not simply back a 1/10 shot. Ideally, you’d be looking to land a bet around the 10/11 or 4/5 mark to get as much cash value out of your welcome bonus as possible.
How does the betting exchange work?
A betting exchange is a site that facilitates punter vs punter betting, rather than the traditional punter vs bookmaker betting setup. An exchange is a live betting market that allows you to back and lay bets against other players at odds that are typically much better than betting on the same selections at an established betting site.
The position of backing a selection is the traditional way that punters will be used to when placing bets. It involves betting on a particular selection to win in a sporting event and, if successful, the bet is paid out. Laying is the position that the bookmaker traditionally takes in that they accept your back bet, effectively betting that the opposite will happen. If your bet loses, the bookie takes your stake as their winnings.
Betting at an exchange effectively allows you to become the bookmaker in that you can be the one to lay a bet. This means you can set the odds that other punters can then back on the exchange. However, it’s important to note that if you lay a bet and it goes on to win, you will need to payout from your own funds to the person that backed the bet at the odds you set. So you should always be cautious when taking the lay position.
You can use football betting exchange strategies to help guide you through the best ways to take advantage of both the back and lay positions. Don’t ever bet on an exchange without doing your research first.
The Importance of Value Bets
When enjoying betting on football, getting the best possible value is something that should be at the top of your to do list. Value betting is probably one of the best football betting strategies that you can use.
What do we mean by “value”? Well, bookmakers don’t all offer the same odds across the board. If you do a bit of shopping around, you’ll find that there can actually be a pretty big disparity between the odds offered by one site compared to another. Occasionally, you’ll find a new bookie offering higher odds than they should for an outcome that you think is likely to happen.
In these scenarios, the value bet is the one that is placed at the best odds for the selection that you feel will win. Finding value when football betting means that you can maximise your returns and even achieve that by reducing your stakes, which is probably the ideal outcome for a punter.
When it comes to value betting, you’ll find lots of competitive odds in England’s lower leagues such as the Championship, League One and League Two. That’s because these leagues are so competitive that even the team at the top of league can be beaten by a team fighting relegation, so the odds reflect that.
Live Football Betting Technique
Betting strategies for football aren’t exclusive to pre-match bets, either. There are certain systems and techniques that can be used for football live betting, too. One of the most popular strategies used with live betting is hedging.
Hedging is a technique that effectively involves betting on all of the possible outcomes in an event to guarantee a profit. The first step is to place a pre-match bet, for example Team A to win the game. Once the game is live, you head to a betting exchange and wait until the lay odds for Team A have rose enough to guarantee that you come out on top.
This can be a hugely effective strategy when backing underdogs, who then go on to score the first goal of the game. It’s likely that Team B will come back and go on to win the game eventually, so your pre-match bet loses, but you placed a lay bet on Team A when they went ahead, so your hedge bet wins. If Team A hold on and win, your pre-match bet wins.
Backing players to be carded in a game is another hugely popular football live betting strategy. To do this, wait for a game to start and watch along with a live stream. If a player gives away a foul or two early in the game, back that player to be booked as quickly as possible. The likelihood is that the next foul will result in a booking. The great thing about this is that you can bet on various players and have multiple bets running simultaneously.
Mathematical Approaches on Football Betting Strategies
One of the quickest and easiest ways that you can take a mathematical approach to football betting strategies is to simply back favourites. This requires no mathematical skills whatsoever, as the calculations have already been complete by the bookmaker in order to create the marker and offer the odds. Favourites are favourites for a reason!
In recent years, the expected goals (xG) system has become a widely accepted formula for predicting whether or not a team can be expected to score in a game. xG models utilise historical data to analyse previous attempts at goal to determine how likely it is for a team to score and presents its results on a scale from 0 to 1. An xG of 0 would indicate a team will not score, while an xG of 1 would indicate a team is certain to score.
An effective staking strategy is another way that you can utilise mathematics to improve your betting outcomes. The oldest and most famous staking system, the Martingale System, involves increasing your stake each time you lose a bet. This can of course become incredibly risky, so many punters now opt for the Kelly Criterion system as one of their go to football betting strategies.
The Kelly Criterion staking system is a calculation that helps you to determine how much of your bankroll you should stake on your bets. It’s generally pretty low (often less than 10%) and, while the wins won’t be huge initially, it allows you the time to slowly build up your bankroll. In time, that initial 10% or so of your bankroll will be considerably more than when you started.
FAQs
What is the best of all football betting strategies?
There is no definitive answer to this. The fact is that different football betting strategies will work for different people. It’s important to do your research and consider your staking/bankroll limits before choosing a strategy to follow.
Will football betting exchange strategies actually work?
Yes they will, if executed correctly. One of the most common uses for football exchanges is hedging or arbitrage betting. This is effectively covering all possible outcomes to guarantee a profit on an event.
How do I guarantee a profit when betting?
It can be hugely challenging, but hedging is one of the most effective ways to do it. You could also consider backing favorites as single bets, which is a longer term tactic. However, it’s important to know that all bets carry a risk factor, no matter how ‘certain’ the result is.
My current betting strategy is not working, what should I do?
If you’ve been utilising a football betting strategy for over several months and it is not yielding results, we recommend trying a different strategy. Losing runs are inevitable in gambling, but an effective strategy should see you in profit over time.
Should I have multiple betting accounts to use football betting strategies?
Yes. Having multiple accounts increases your ability to find the best value for your bets. It also makes hedging/arbitrage betting much easier, as you have more odds to choose from. You can also benefit from multiple welcome bonuses, instead of just one.