Betting on football at the exchange and only backing favourites profitable?
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If you were to bet on football matches and only bet on favourites with odds between 1.4 and 1.8 at an exchange and as the match progresses if you don’t think your team is going to win then start to lay off against your team to cut down your losses, would this be profitable long term? It seems to me that it would be if you were disciplined and had a bank roll big enough to cover variances. What iv seen so far is that 6/7 out of 10 matches with a clear favourite with these odds goes onto win and if you are laying off a portion of your stake when they go on to loose your cutting down your looses on loosing bets big time. Plus the odds at the exchange is always better than the bookies for these kind of bets and you will never get gubbed.
Would this be considered a basic form of trading?
Also where is the flaws in this strategy?
+0March 24, 2017 at 1:13 pm
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Law of averages reggy,If your team scores 1st you can cash out for profit.Should happen more often than not with the favourites yes.Do a few low stake bets for fun,see how you get on!
+0When would you start laying off your team?. Known fact more goals are scored in the second half. If you back a team at 1.4 before KO, what odds would it be at HT if score is still 0-0?.
+0I usually start laying off mid way through second half if it not looking good. It does depends on the odds sometimes the lay odds are to big though.
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6/7 times out of 10?
If your backing 1.5 and wins 66% then obv your making a loss, if win 67% then it’s a profit. 6/7 out of 10 is just crazy to think you can guess a figure based on short term memory and base any real strategy on it!
You need to be much more accurate!
Of course the fav wins more often than not but that is all built into the price and payout.
I did some research on bookie odds before and if you had back all the favs 1/8 and shorter in the big leagues across Europe (eng, spa, fra, get) over the last 10 years then you would have been in profit.
Given that the exchange odds are generally bigger then it follows that you make more profit minus commission though, not sure how much that eats in.
ive done no research on exchange odds though.
+0If the odds are correct then you’d probably end up in the same position if you layed off in every game as you would if you let all the games run as inevitably laying off some games would cut your losses but in others you’d be laying off and losing out. There isn’t really an edge with this strategy.
There are too many variables involved in football to make it profitable long term in my experience.
+0OK I think I might be being thick here but to me this boils down to mug betting. There’s so much I don’t get … for example 1.8 is not a ‘clear favourite’. Why football specifically? How does laying off change this in any way as the over-round adjusts to the live match position?
I can see no edge to expolit here, either mathematically or systemically, as far as I understand the proposal?
At best there may be a trend expolit but I’m not sure there is data to back that up?
– Fog, out of interest was the profit you saw on short odds favs meaningful, i.e. worth doing, or negligable?
+0Just had a look at this to throw some figures out
Eng Prem league games odds between 1.4 – 1.8
2016/17 season
Home Fav 23 games = 16 won, 7 lost, Profit 12.87%
Away Fav 32 games = 23 won, 9 lost, Profit 14.97%2015/16
Home Fav 30 games = 12 won, 18 lost, Profit -34.4%
Away Fav 25 games = 16 won, 9 lost, Profit 6.8%+1
I don’t think it was worth doing. It was about 2% return on investment. But I don’t know how much confidence I have. Although it covers a span of 10 years really only a strong fav like that happened 73 times so not a huge sample space.
My theory was that the good teams are getting better all the time and the odds (based on historic results) are not really keeping up with them. Or bookies attracting customers by offering value odds on favs but making money back once they get you hooked.
But I only found it profitable and barely profitable on 1/8 and shorter, so only huge favs that don’t come up often at all.
+0If I can throw my thoughts in as I use the football markets quite a bit.
In my opinion it’s the specific odds of 1.4 to 1.8 that make this unappealing – it looks as if it’s taking it down the route of some of the horse racing systems where the rules look as if there are there to ‘back fit’ things we already know happened. Fog is spot on, you can’t build a strategy on a ‘snap shot’.
The market I use most is the ‘More Than 1.5 Goals’ but hang off for a quarter of an hour or so until the odds scrub up a bit better – ok, you’ll miss a few but if you hold fire until the odds have come out a bit it gives you some wriggle room to trade out for a smaller loss if you get to half time and neither side look like they could get a goal if they stayed out there all night. If the first goal arrives after that first quarter hour and before half time the odds fall like a stone (you need to watch a few markets, you’ll soon get a feel for how the markets move) – then I’m out.
Statistically the ‘More Than 1.5 Goals’ market is more forgiving – were I thinking of taking a position on the RoI v Wales game tonight (which I’m not because I’m going out for a beer) the odds swing where I need them to be whoever scores the first goal.
Not for everyone but I’m a ‘low risk’ player and this works for me.
+0So basically you think the market is consistently wrong for heavy favourites? So much so it will outweigh the false odds on situations like a dead rubber, sacked manager in the underdog or nonsense odds we see sometimes in the fa cup.
And you also think the odds also swing the other way to being consistently wrong to give you an edge on the lay? Which on the number of games I’ve seen in my accas which appear to be losing then get a later winner may not work out
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It sounds suspiciously similar to the old “laying the draw” tactic!
+0Thanks Fog.
2% isn’t exciting, agreed, but I do wonder if you were able to combine the approach with a consistent offer, like the Hills 4+, Boyle crossbar or some of the in-plays then it might nudge that up to something meaningful.
I guess the concern is bankroll as your would need to be making chunky bets on the short odds to get to a worthwhile cash margin so risk of ruin might be a factor.
Thinking about in-plays got me to wondering if we’re due another 365 £50 free gift.
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