The Safe Websites team have put together a guide on the preferred Football Betting Strategies of 2021.
Pros of Arbitrage betting
- Arbitrage betting strategy provides you an opportunity to earn a guaranteed profit on your investment.
- It allows you to win bets in a game even if you are not a great handicapper.
- There is zero risk involved in the betting. Arbitrage betting ensures a compensation for you regardless of an event result.
- Bookmakers normally differ on odds for football matches, so there are plenty of opportunities available for arbitrage betting in football.
Cons of Arbitrage betting
- In this betting strategy, the profit margin is very low. Normally, you can earn 2 to 5% profit margin in a match.
- Placing an arbitrage bet can take a lot of time. You will have to put more effort in finding bookmakers with suitable odds.
- Since the profit margin is very low in Arbitrage betting, you may need a large investment to earn a good profit.
- Bookmakers don’t like arbitrage betting strategy, they will either limit or close your betting account for using arbitrage betting.
Price Boost Exploitation
Sometimes bookmakers offer higher odds than usual for a particular football team as a promotion strategy. This is called a price boost. The back odds they are offering can be high as compared to the lay odds on betting exchanges. You can easily use these price boosts to make some profit without any risk. Price boost exploitation strategy works similar to arbitrage and matched betting, but the price boost makes this more attractive for football gamblers.
The profits you can make from this method can be very small (£1-£3) than other betting strategies, but if you master it and use it every day for betting You could easily make £100 to £150 a week. To understand the price boost exploitation in detail, let’s consider an example given below.
There are some good football betting websites to take a look at for more ideas. Please see the list below:
- WhatAcca.com – A UK based Football Accumulator betting website
- BParlay.com – A US based Football Parlay sportsbetting website
- Gamblingcommission.gov.uk – The UK Gambling Commission website
Price Boost Example – let’s suppose, there is a Premier League match between Liverpool and Chelsea, and a bookmaker does a price boost on Liverpool to win at odds of 4.5 instead of 4.0. On the other side, a betting exchange offers a lay odds of 4.0 against Liverpool. You can use this difference of odds to make some profit without any risk.
- Let’s say, you Place a £20 back bet on Liverpool’s win with the bookmaker at 4.5 odds, and also place a lay bet (lay £22.50 with £67.50 liability) against Liverpool win with the betting exchange at 4.0 odds.
- If Liverpool wins the match, your back bet becomes successful. You earn a total profit of £70 from the bookmaker. You also lose the lay bet at the betting exchange, you need to pay £67.50 liability to the betting exchange. Overall you earn a total profit of £2.50 (£70 – £67.50).
- If Liverpool loses or draws the match, your back bet becomes unsuccessful and you lose your £20 on the bookmaker. On the other side, you win your lay bet on the betting exchange, and earn a profit of £22.50. Overall you earn a total profit of £2.50 (£22.50 – £20).
Pros of Price Boost
- Price boost betting is a risk-free betting technique, if you make your calculations accurately.
- It is one of the easiest betting strategies, and doesn’t involve any complex calculations.
- If the price boost odds are higher than the lay odds, it can help you earn a big profit.
Cons of Price Boost
- Normally, the profit margin is very low in the Price Boost.
- You may need a large bank roll to earn a good profit
- You need to search for the price boost offers from bookmakers, which can be time consuming.
The Value Betting
The value betting is a great way to exploit the miscalculated odds of a bookmaker for profit. Sometimes bookmakers can make errors while predicting the outcome of the match, and offer low or high odds for a match. Value betting allows you to take advantage of the bookmaker’s wrong prediction. A value bet is a bet that has a higher winning probability than a bookmaker’s odds suggest.
There is a mathematical approach that you can use to determine the value bet. You can use the following formula to determine whether a bet truly offers value or not.
If you calculate the value of a bet and it comes greater than 1, then it is a value bet and you should place a suitable stake on the bet, but if the value of the bet comes less than 1, then it is not a value bet, and you should avoid placing the bet.
Example of Value Betting – consider an example of a football match between England and Spain. Let’s say a bookmaker is offering odds of 2.0 for England, which suggests that according to the bookmaker, England has 50% chance of winning. But if you think that the bookmaker has miscalculated the odds and actual winning probability of the England is 60%, you can calculate the value of the bet as follows,
In the example, the value of the bet is greater than 1, it is a value bet and you can easily place a bet on England without any risk.
Pros of the Value betting
- Value betting is a less complex strategy as compared to others, and most of the gamblers prefer using the value betting.
- You don’t need multiple betting accounts to use value betting strategy.
- This betting strategy doesn’t involve multiple betting.
- It reduces the risk involved in the bet.
Cons of the Value betting
- Value betting doesn’t guarantee a win.
- Mistakes while calculating the actual winning probability can be very costly.
- You need to search for the bookmaker’s mistakes and miscalculated odds to place a value bet, which can be time consuming.
The Kelly Criterion
The Kelly Criterion is the most effective betting strategy that can be used in different forms of sports betting, especially in football. This betting technique allows you to create a balance between the risk and the reward in a bet. In football betting, Kelly criterion technique helps you to maximize the potential returns on bets and reduces the risk of losing your entire bankroll.
The Kelly Criterion Formula
The Kelly Criterion formula basically uses the odds value and probabilities to calculate the optimum percentage of our bankroll you can risk in the bet. The Kelly Criterion Formula is given below,
F is the calculated fraction of your bankroll that you can use to place the bet.
B is the decimal odds – 1. For example, if you bet on a team with 3 odds, the B value will be (3 – 1) 2.
P is the probability to win the bet. For example, a bet with a 50% chance of success has a winning probability of 0.50.
Q is the probability to lose the bet.
Kelly Criterion Example – to understand how the Kelly Criterion formula works, let’s consider an example of a Premier League match. Let’s suppose, you want to bet on a match between Liverpool and Everton. The bookmaker is offering 2.1 odds for Liverpool and 3.2 odds for Everton. You believe that there are 55% (0.55 probability) chance of Liverpool winning, so you decide to bet on Liverpool. You can calculate your risk-free stake value by using Kelly Criterion formula.
B = 2.1 – 1 = 1.1
P = 0.55
Q = 1 – 0.55 = 0.45
According to the Kelly Criterion formula, you can stake 14.09% of your bankroll on the bet. If you have £100 in your bankroll, you can risk £14.09 on the bet to earn an attractive profit. If the formula returns a negative value, then you should avoid to risk your money on the bet.
Pros of the Kelly Criterion
- It helps you to calculate the accurate size of betting value. It is the easiest way to decide the amount you can risk on a bet.
- It helps you to determine the risk involved in the bet, and prevents you to put your money on a losing team.
- It is an excellent tool for bankroll management if you are a professional gambler.
Cons of the Kelly Criterion
- You need to know the correct probabilities of a bet to calculate your stake value by using this formula.
- You can lose a lot of money if you miscalculate it to some extent.
- The Kelly Criterion formula can sometimes suggest a higher stake for a bet, which can be dangerous to your bankroll.