In the UK, the most popular sport for online betting has always been football. Whilst most people lose money by guessing what is going to happen in any given game, with a good strategy, you can place the best bets in football and win in the long term. These four best football betting strategies will make you money, by using opportunities offered by bookies in their competition to gain new customers.
Football accumulator offers
In an accumulator bet, you select a maximum of four or five bets, even if there is no limit on the number of matches you can bet on, and place a wager on all of them. One of the most popular offers at many of the topfootballbettingsites.co.uk is that you get a refund of your stake if only one selection fails to win. This creates a great opportunity to win without risk by laying each selection of the accumulator on a betting exchange, which means betting against a certain outcome to happen.
The strategy is to select games that are not played at the same time and where there is at least a two-and-a-half-hour gap between each match. The idea is that if only one selection of the accumulator loses, you get a refund of your stake. When you have your accumulator ready, place your wager and lay the first selection at the betting exchange, checking the terms and conditions before you start in case they require a minimum price or number of selections. Also, check the commission rates. Initially, you will be laying against your original stake at the bookie. When one selection loses, you keep laying. This time, you are laying against the refund offered by the sportsbook and the stakes are much smaller. You need to keep doing this until you hit two losing selections. At this point, you have locked the profit and it is in your betting exchange account.
Football matched betting
Probably the simplest profitable football strategy, all you need is a free bet offer. Often, there are free bets only available for a limited time on which you can apply the matched betting strategy and win without any risks. All you do is back a certain outcome at the bookies and lay it at a betting exchange. Thanks to the free bet offered by the sportsbook, profit is guaranteed.
There are a couple of ways this can be done. If a bookmaker offers a £10 free bet if you wager £10 you can place the qualifying bet. As an example, this could be for Aston Villa to win against Everton at home. At the same time, you go to a betting exchange and lay Everton. Whilst there is usually a small loss because of the difference in the odds, the free £10 bet will cover it. A word of warning is to be careful to check the terms and conditions of the free bet promotion to avoid any risks.
Football price boosts
Sportsbooks often offer a price boost on football matches as a promotion. These enhanced odds are usually for a limited time on a certain market, which could be the match-winner, the first goal-scorer, or something else. These special deals are usually focused on teams in the English Premier League and the Champions League.
The increased odds give an advantage but going one step further can secure profit whatever the result. Use the services of a betting exchange to lay (bet against) the same outcome or find another bookie and place a bet on the opposite outcome on odds that will bring you a profit in any situation. There are matched betting calculators for you to work out the lay stake, taking into consideration the bet type qualifier, the back stake, sportsbook odds, betting exchange odds and commission. This will confirm the profit to be expected whatever the outcome.
Football refund offers
Refund promotions mean that instead of losing you get your wager back in certain cases. A classic football refund offer is if a game finishes 0:0 a lot of bookies will give your money back if you placed a bet on another correct score. There are other promotions that will give you back your bet in other circumstances.
Using the 0:0 score example, you can make money by finding a correct score option different from 0:0 where the odds of the bookie and the lay odds on a betting exchange are close. Place the bet that qualifies for the promotion at the bookie and lay the same outcome in the betting exchange. Then, place another lay bet, this time on the 0:0 correct score. The odds should be low enough to create the chance of winning. Also, place an underlay bet. An underlay aims not to get similar results whatever happens. But to break even if your lay bet on the exchange wins and get a huge profit if the bet at the bookie wins.
The same principle applies to all refund offers. You have to find solid odds for the back option at the bookie and the lay at the betting exchange first. Then check the lay price for the outcome that could be refunded. If they are low enough, profits can be good.