Anyone may go to a sports bookmaker and place a bet on their favourite football club; no analysis or strategy is required. However, betting on your favourite team just because they’re playing doesn’t make financial sense over the course of a season. Instead, concentrate on understanding the concept of ‘value.’
This method can be used to calculate a team’s value for each given match:
- Calculate the probability of a team winning in terms of a percentage.
- Calculate the most accurate decimal odds for that team to win (decimals are easier than fractions when it comes to the maths).
- Multiply the predicted percentage by the decimal price.
- Any score of 1.00 or higher indicates that the team has worth, and you should consider placing a wager.
Participate in Premier League betting and put this strategy to the test throughout the season.
Recognizing Value in Action
Consider a high-profile example: the FA Cup final between Chelsea and Arsenal in 2020. Chelsea was offered at 10/11 by Paddy Power and 8/10 by Ladbrokes. Arsenal, on the other hand, was given odds of 7/2 and 15/4 to win.
Many inexperienced bettors would have been hesitant to back Arsenal based on these odds. Others, on the other hand, would have spotted an opportunity. If we take the best odds for an Arsenal victory, which are 15/4 at Ladbrokes, we get 4.75. To find value at that price, simply estimate that Arsenal has a 22 percent chance of winning the game: 0.22 x 4.75 = 1.05.
That’s the same as Arsenal only winning the game once if it were played five times. Some Chelsea supporters would have agreed with this assessment; their team was the clear favourite to win the trophy. Arsenal supporters, on the other hand, may have focused on their team’s well-deserved spot in the final after defeating previous champions Manchester City in the semi-final.
Despite the doubters, Arsenal were making headway under Mikel Arteta, and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang was one of English football’s most in-form forwards. All of these factors will have been considered by seasoned gamblers, and the more astute will have determined that backing Arsenal was always a good bet. After going behind early on, Arsenal came back to win 2-1, with Aubameyang scoring twice.
Mathematical Methods for Value Estimation
While picking the ideal bet (i.e. the one with the best odds) should always be the aim, you must first know where to seek and, more importantly, what you’re looking for. It’s pointless to understand the concept of value if you don’t know how to apply it. You can achieve this by employing a sophisticated football betting strategy called as Poisson Distribution.
In simple terms, the Poisson Distribution is a method of determining how frequently random events will occur over a given period of time. If you know Arsenal averages 1.5 goals a game, for example, you can use a distribution formula to predict how likely they are to score XX goals in a given scenario. To do so, you must first determine a team’s offence and defence strengths.
To calculate a team’s attack rating, you must first know the average number of goals scored per team, each game (home and away). Simply divide the number of goals scored (at home) by the number of games in a season to get the averages. The same procedure is used to calculate the average of away goals.
After you’ve determined how good an attack is, you’ll need to determine how strong a team’s defence is. To calculate the defense’s strength, swap the goals scored to goals conceded in the formulae above.
Putting Everything Together
You should get four numbers after completing these equations:
- Attack Strength Home
- Attack Strength Away
- Defence Strength Home
- Defence Strength Away
You may now begin to assess a team’s strength in comparison to the league average. Arsenal’s attack strength would be 1.842 (35/19) if they scored 35 goals at home in 19 games. Let’s say the previous season’s league attack strength (at home) was 1.492. (i.e. 567 goals divided by 380 games).
These two statistics are used to split Arsenal’s score by the season average, which is 1.235 (1.842/1.492) in this case. After determining the strength of the home team’s attack, repeat the process to establish the strength of the away team’s defence.
You’ll have two numbers at this stage. Let’s pretend the opposing team (Chelsea) has a defence strength (away) of 0.881 for the sake of this illustration. You can then multiply these two figures by the season average to get the following result:
1.623 = 1.235 x 0.881 x 1.492
This simply indicates that Arsenal is expected to score 1.623 goals against Chelsea, according to the statistics.
Other mitigating circumstances around the game, such as injuries and current form, can be applied to the maths to aid your ultimate judgement on the game.
Value-Based Betting vs. Technical Betting
You may have heard us talk about getting ‘value’ when it comes to football betting, but what exactly does that imply? Isn’t the goal to put bets in the hopes of winning the most money possible every time?
While the following is accurate, taking a longer-term approach to football betting and recognising “value” betting opportunities will give you a much better chance of making money than betting to win every time.
When visiting the football area of the finest football betting sites, you will see that there is no section labelled “Value Bets,” thus it is up to the client to identify these types of wagers in order to get an advantage over the house when placing a wager.
For example, Liverpool could be betting at even money to win the Premier League against Manchester United. If you bet on the Reds at that price, you’ll basically be doubling your money if they beat the Red Devils in 90 minutes.
However, you may argue that Liverpool has a better than 50% chance of winning the game. According to your estimates or available data, the Merseyside squad has a 60 percent or even a 65 percent probability of victory.
That would imply that Liverpool has value in your opinion. The fact that the bookies would double your money if you bet on a pick where you believe the odds are stacked in your favour may encourage you to do so.
To get the best value, compare different bookmaker odds.
Most skilled bettors will have multiple bookmaker accounts, which gives you a lot more flexibility when it comes to football betting. When it comes to football betting odds, bookmakers often differ, and you might be able to support a club at 2/1 while everyone else is going 6/4.
There may be a bet on a particular team in the days building up to kick-off, and one bookie is either slow to adjust their prices or simply wants to take that side on.
Is Scorecast/Wincast Betting Worth It?
Scorecasts and Wincasts are entertaining alternative wagers for individuals looking to maximise the value of their bet, but if you enter them blindly, you’ll be walking right into the bookies’ arms.
Customers must correctly predict the First Goalscorer in both Scorecast and Wincast bets. As a result, it’s critical to do your homework and figure out which players have been scoring the team’s first goals and how often they’ve been able to do so.
This includes knowing which players are on penalty duty and which players are taking free kicks, giving a player a considerably better chance of scoring his team’s first goal.
When it comes to a Scorecast, you must also determine the anticipated scoreline for a game, and it definitely pays to review the previous six matches involving each club in order to identify betting trends that may aid you in this wager.
If you’re betting on the Premier League, for example, you can use generic statistics like the most common final scores. When it comes to arranging Scorecasts, we like teams that are excellent defensively so that we can potentially combine a certain player with a sequence of scorelines such as 1-0, 2-0, and 3-0.
We need to forecast the Full-Time Result in Wincast betting so you can use the basic arithmetic we mentioned at the beginning of this post for that leg of your bet.
It’s also useful to review recent results involving both teams. If you’re not convinced by the percentages approach, look at the home team’s home form, and the same goes for the away team. If you’re still not convinced, look at the overall league table standings.
If you want to delve deeper into your study, we recommend looking at statistics like shots on target and predicted goals, which will help you get the most accurate picture possible before placing your bets.
Lay Betting
In recent years, ‘laying’ has become a particularly popular sort of advanced football betting. This betting technique involves placing a lay bet against an outcome rather than betting on one side to win. If you lay a team, for example, you are effectively betting on the team to lose or draw.
Consider the following scenario: Manchester City is hosting West Ham at the Etihad Stadium. In this situation, bookmakers believe a West Ham victory is implausible. As an example, let’s say you’re betting on the Hammers to win at 10/1. If you bet NZ$500 on West Ham to win, you’ll make a profit of NZ$50 if Manchester City draws or wins. In this light, the lay bet is clearly one of the safest football betting tactics.
The lay bet, of course, necessitates an inversion of regular odds. In this case, instead of 10/1, your chance of winning is 1/10 (thus the NZ$50 payout on a NZ$500 gamble). As a result, laying football teams with a slim chance of winning will amass a sizable bank over time (a degree of patience is required).
Similarly, if you believe you have a line on a certain match-up that the bookies have overlooked, laying the favourites could provide a large profit. If Manchester City, for example, is missing important players due to injury but is still a high favourite to win based on reputation alone, it may be worth betting against them for a potentially lucrative payout.
Asian Handicap
Asian Handicapping, a type of fixed odds betting that originated in the Far East, is another complex football betting approach that is gaining popularity around the world.
Because the Asian market enjoyed betting on English football, the Asian Handicap was born. However, the risk of losing money on a full-time draw did not appeal to bettors, leading to a system in which both sides in a given match are allocated a handicap or spread before the game. This is most commonly supplied in fractional form (e.g., 0.5 goals, 1.5 goals), which eliminates the chance of a tie.
The formula also means that smaller teams have a much better chance of winning against the spread. If West Ham were to play away against Manchester City, who had goal odds of -1.5, both at fixed odds of 11/8, West Ham’s chances of winning would be significantly greater than the 10/1 they were initially set at. As a result, while lay betting is typically utilised to develop a piggy bank in little, incremental amounts, Asian Handicap betting encourages greater, single winners.
Related Post:
