Betting Approach - What are the best types of bet to place on football and why ?

Betting Approach - What are the best types of bet to place on football and why ?

As mentioned before in a few others blogs of this type, right now seems a very good time to take a break from focusing on betting directly and look at different aspects of punting, to understand.

• How we do things.
• What we've learned.
• What we do wrong.
• How we can improve by sharing our thoughts. 

Whilst all the time considering that we need to bet cautiously, the olbg betting school has a comprehensive feature on How to gamble responsibly and bet sensibly. 

Gambling responsibility has always been a consideration, and all articles endeavor to reiterate this sensible gambling approach.

Below you can see a selection of members betting strategies. 

Intro - Tommy Buckley

I'm a punter at heart and I've always been fascinated by how other punters approach their betting, what bets they place and what markets they bet on

All with the hope and motivation of having an interesting discussion to learn from them and hopefully help others learn something as well. 

This is the 3rd blog in a series covering different elements of Betting Approach, the first one covered what we've learned from football betting over the years.

The 2nd one looked at what I and fellow punters believe to be the most common mistakes made by punters including excellent points raised by fellow OLBG members.

In this 3rd blog I'm going to look at answering this question:- "What are the best types of bet to place on football and why"?

E.G win singles, lucky 15's, correct score patents, straight accumulators, lay bets etc. 

Like with the other points raised, there will be different people thinking different things, different bets will appeal to others and people will find some bet types recommend as not right for them at all, it's all about discussing our views and i hope you find this interesting and useful, feel free to offer any comments you may have . 

A Wife and 13-year old twins mean strictly limited betting funds for me and largely betting for fun, so while I like to adopt a professional approach in terms of bet selection, studying form, statistics, etc, I do bet for fun and have the hope of hitting something decent from very small unit stakes bets. 

Heinz Accumulator On Match Results - Tommy Buckley

An example of my small unit stakes bets will be say 10p/20p Heinz, and for those who don't know, a Heinz is a multiple made up of 57 bets consisting of 6 selections combining for doubles, trebles, 4-folds, 5-folds and the 6-fold.

I do mix and match the types of Heinz bets I do, sometimes it will be 6 fairly short price favourites, some times I take a punt and put 6 draws together in a Heinz, thankfully hit a few of those and made big money from small, other times I will mix short prices with draws, basically anything for some added interest and fun in the hope of winning. 

Here is an example of a 10p Heinz (£5.70) + £1 accumulator bet.

6 teams selected approximately all 4/6 to win.  4/6 is a common price for favourites, these are the returns I'd be looking at those odds with those 6 teams combined 

6 winners = £34.86 for the Heinz + £21.43 for the accumulator

Total returns for all 6 winning would be £56.29 + any particular bonus payments offered, with many online bookmakers offering bonuses on multiple bets.

As you can see there isn't a lot to celebrate about doing a Heinz at those odds unless you get 5 winners, but 2 winners at least give you some sort of return and 4 winners from 6 give you a big percentage of your stake back and that's better than getting nothing back. 

My target with the bet at those odds is obviously believing the teams will win, wouldn't do the bet if I didn't, and I know the returns compared to stakes will be very good if they do all win, even if 1 team fails I will double my money at those odds of 4/6 if the odds are bigger the return will be bigger. 

Betting multiples there is always the chance that at least 1 selection fails but betting at those odds in a Heinz I usually get at least 4 out of 6 and quite often it's 5 out of 6 so I know that a lot of the time I will get at least a big chunk of my stake money back or double my stake. 

Bets like Heinz's are not for everybody, but it's what I like to do and it is what works for me as I understand how I'm betting.

If you can do that then that's half the battle in making it pay, and you can tweak things to increase returns.

All Draw Multiples - Tommy Buckley

For some reason I've always enjoyed looking at the fixture lists and targeting matches which I think could be draws, it's unusual because bookmakers will tell you that vast majority of punters don't even consider the draw as they look for a definitive winner one way or other, but like I say it's something I've always enjoyed doing.

Those of you that have followed me and seen my blogs will know I've written a series of blogs where I've posted the all draw multiple challenge quite simply multiple bets made up entirely of draws and then reported how I 've done each week, I'll be doing it again at points during the new season. 

For now my standard strategy in terms of bet type and personal staking for all draw bets is very low unit stakes lucky 15's, lucky 31's and 63's depending on how many games I've selected for draws.

If I've only targeted 6 I might split them into two mixed groups of 4 and put them in lucky 15's or I might do a straight lucky 63. 

A standard lucky 15 made up of 4 draws is a bet that I feel has a lot of merits in terms of bet cost against potential returns and profits, the risk/reward ratio makes it worthwhile for punters. 

Standard odds of 9/4 for a draw will produce a guaranteed profit if you get 2 winning draws from your 4 selections, 3 or more draws together and you are looking at huge returns with 30/1+ for trebles and 100/1+ for the 4-folds. 

For an example, if you put on a £1 lucky 15 on 4 draws all at odds of 9/4 then this is how the cost & potential returns would look: £1 lucky 15 = £15 stake

They are the basic returns based on all winners priced at 9/4 in a £1 lucky 15, of course, the offers/terms vary at bookmakers as some will pay double or treble odds 1 winner and others will pay huge bonuses on fully successful bets so the potential returns could be even better. 

I use £1 unit to make the example easy to explain but of course you can have plenty of fun and potentially win decent money with 5p, 10p, 20p, 30p, 50p unit stakes in your multiples, what matters is that whatever your unit stake in all draw lucky 15, you know that 2 winners will guarantee a profit and any more than that and you are looking huge profit and percentage returns on your initial stake. 

Even if you only get 1 winner then at least you'll get a chunk of your stake back via the 9/4 single, as stated some bookmakers will pay double or even treble odds 1 winner in a lucky 15 so unless all 4 selections lose you'll be getting a decent percentage back.

Trading of Favourites on Exchanges -Nors

I predominately place lay bets on football favourites and then trade out on them when the favourites don't score before half time or go behind.

I then get out of the football bet with a profit or a loss, I very rarely let the bet go for 90 minutes.

For those of you unsure about trading on exchanges remember to source the information from OLBG and its fantastically knowledgeable members.

Back Away Teams - Man O Bong

For the EPL I will be looking almost solely at away wins.

I have been trialing for 2 seasons some personal ratings using various sources and numbers and then crunching with bets odds to find what might be considered "value" 

Those that qualified last year returned a 37.47pt profit to single point level stakes

Interestingly, they did choose some of the more unlikely outcomes, deeming some huge prices as value including some 28 selections at odds of 10/1 or greater - 

There were just four winners from these Swansea twice at 11.50 and 12.00 as well as Stoke (18.00) & Aston Villa @ 12.00 

These matches were sufficient to add some 26.5pts profit to the overall total.

On the flip side, I also found some value in home wins when the prices (deemed to be value) were greater than 2.50 and 14.43 points profit over 102 selections is still a nice 10%+ ROI. 

Now, I have to admit to not having backed all of these and thus showing the fruits for my labour, in the previous season (2013/14) the homes showed a 7.5pt loss.

The aways, a modest 4.30pts profit.

But I feel I have something to work with for the coming season.

Asian Handicaps - Arniehi

The majority of my football betting is made up of Asian Handicap betting in singles, and I tend to think it's one of the better ways of consolidating a long-term profit with good discipline.

Because the offered markets are generally around the even money mark, and there are options to buy/sell value, it can be a good way to increase returns and provide a bit of cover. 

On the other hand, it can be extremely frustrating when a winning bet becomes a push on a late consolation or something to that extent, especially where the extra return isn't offered at a very good rate, but in general, it's suited me fairly well.

As a general (and fairly loose, it should be said) rule with such betting, I tend to stay away from most things with a handicap of 2.0 or more goals - particularly in the Premier League - because that cushion is often deemed sufficient by teams who then lack the motivation to push on and would rather coast to the victory. 

For those of you who want to find What Are Asian Handicaps?  remember to source the information from the OLBG  blogs and betting school articles, + the fantastically knowledgeable members.

Both Teams To Score, Correct Score Multiplies and Accumulators - Arniehi

All this talk about strategies and approaches to betting has got me re-evaluating my own approach to betting. I've spent the last two seasons trying to make singles, doubles, and trebles work with varied success.

Some months I'll make a small profit and the next I'll make a loss. 

Obviously I only speak for myself here but I just feel that with these types of bets, usually under the 10/1 mark, I'm spending a great deal of time researching just to win a tiny bit of profit. 

I'm never going to get rich betting like this. 

That's where multiples come in. 

As bettors aren't we all in search of that big win? I know I am, or at least I was but I lost my way in trying to eke out a consistent profit and it hasn't really worked. Longshots all the way for me from now on. 

Thinking back about my betting successes in the past it's the longer odds multiples that have been the most profitable and the most enjoyable. 

There are so many benefits to multiples; first of all you stake less, if it's an accumulator which is my preferred bet type because you only have to place 1 bet to cover a multitude of games. 

Secondly, you can have 1 bet to keep you entertained for a longer period of time; providing your selections kick-off at different times and the earlier selections are winners. 

Thirdly, the effect of multiplying odds together can make prices that you would have placed singles on seem much more lucrative. 

The list goes on. I wrote an article for another betting site that I contribute to about the advantages of Correct Score betting vs Win &  btts betting. 

You can check out the best bookies for BTTS betting via the bookie guides.

A few people have got in touch with me after reading that article to share their successes with backing correct scores in multiples; we are talking big successes, in the '000s. That's going to be my approach this coming season. 

Backing Correct Scores in multiples. 

Arsenal 2-1 Liverpool

Arsenal 3-1 Liverpool

Chelsea 2-1 Man Utd

Chelsea 3-1 Man Utd

Man City 2-1 Spurs

Man City 3-1 Spurs 

Cover those bets in one multiple as 12 doubles and 8 trebles. 

66% of Win & BTTS results in the Premier League in the last 3 years have been either 2-1 or 3-1 results. 

3-2, 4-1, 4-2, etc are all much less likely and whilst they do crop up every now and then they aren't that likely to. 2-1 tends to be in the region of 8 to 12/1 and 3-1 is roughly 16 to 25/1. 

Multiplying those together gets you some truly huge prices. The people that have messaged me their bet slips have had winning trebles in the region of 2,000/1 - 4,000/1 and a winning double will usually be about 200/1 so that can cover you for a good while. 

One winning double covers about 10 of these multiples and a winning treble covers at least 100. I have a good feeling I can land one or two next season.

Give it a few weeks to find out who's good at winning games but also conceding (Spurs last season spring to mind for 2-1 wins) and then pick your favourite games each day or weekend and sit back and wait for a winner! As I mentioned earlier as well I'll be backing BTTS accumulators and W-D-W accumulators in the English leagues. 

I've had big wins in the past on these you just have to accept that you are going to lose 95% of the time but that 1 win will usually cover that and more!

Over/Under Goals - Undertherobe

For me, it's going to be the over/under goals markets. I've flitted about with various systems over the years but often struggle to keep them going just through sheer boredom.

In the end, I always end up going back to the same system that makes a steady enough profit for me to keep it going.

I often find that I struggle to bet on the EPL as subjectively as I can, and prefer other leagues. 

Both Teams To Score + Win multiples - Matija Krajnik

So why do people bet? winning money is key. with a combination of luck, knowledge, and sometimes bold outright confidence.

So do you lump on singles and hope for a good return? 

Or tiny amounts on huge 12 fold accas

Neither I would say the best type of bet to do for me is a 4 four both teams to score and either 3 winners and a draw or if you dare risk (knowledge/confidence) then all 4 winners? 

A simple combination of those will combine to give huge winnings meaning the useless and hopefully 12 fold acca's are out.

For example a winning example from myself I placed a £2.50 BTTS 3 wins and 1 draw the returns were £165 - this along with an occasional couple of pounds on a predicted scoreline or FGS make betting a profitable hobby.

Round Up

So they are a combination of views of fellow OLBG members and my own in terms of what we think the best types of football bets are and why - as you will see it's an entirely individual, personalised question and people will have different views, plenty have been covered above and I hope they interest and help in some way.

Readers of this blog can receive the best tips from OLBG members via the tipping competitions

There is a forum thread discussing this within the Premier League forum on OLBG, indeed that's where a lot of these were originally posted and big thanks to everybody highlighted who contributed.

Feel free to offer any thoughts you have there and also feel free to post your thoughts on twitter via @olbg or to me personally @tbuckleythinks,

I'm always up for interesting discussions and to listen to what people have to say