Guide to Each Way Betting (with Q+A)

With Cheltenham coming up, I’ve decided to write this guide and the subsequent thread to hopefully stop other threads getting hijacked by E/W betting. So all questions in here please.
I’ve deliberately put this in the matched betting forum instead of the newbie forum because I don’t see it as a newbie skill. No offence to any newcomers, but there really is a knack to this. You have to be very confident with horse betting before you do this because if it goes wrong, it can go VERY wrong. You have been warned. Also, this needs quite a big float (1K+) so if you’re just starting out, look away now.

Each way betting is used for two main reasons, when there is an extra place race and when there is what bookies call a “bad each way race”
hopefully you have read Matts guide to extra places
https://matchedbettingblog.com/extra-place-offers/

but i’ll quickly go through the basics. First things first, When you place the bet you will notice that double the stake is taken. This is because when you bet each way you are actually placing two bets, one to win and one to place. Once you have placed your back bet, you now have to place TWO lay bets, one to cover the win part and one for the place part. Obviously, the value of each is half of your original back bet. You need to find the terms of the race and find out how many places they are paying, and at what fraction of odds. This is usually clearly stated.

To find the place odds (in decimal odds), you subtract 1, divide by the fraction of odds, then add the 1 back on.

Lets take Gubstar, who’s being offered at 16/1 with 1/4 place odds and 3 places.

16/1 = 17 decimal
17-1 = 16,
/4 = 4
+1 = 5
so the place odds for Gubstar is 5.

just to be redundant, here’s a harder one

say he’s going off at 11/4 and its only 1/5 odds

11/4 = 3.75 decimal
-1 = 2.75
/5 = 0.55
+1 = 1.55
so now his odds to place are 1.55

Now you know the place odds being offered you can easily compare them to the exchange and lay accordingly.

Doing an extra place race is pretty straight-forward, find a horse with close odds, back, lay, hope! Its usually much better to do several horses over several bookies for these offers to increase your chances of hitting the extra place. Don’t forget, most gubbed accounts can still do the extra place offers.

To take advantage of a bad each race (E/W arbing) you have to understand how it works. Basically a bookie will offer very short odds on the favourite, and unfairly long odds on the others. That is fine on the win market, maybe the other horses really don’t have a chance (especially Gubstar), but because the other horses have a very good chance of coming second or third, by offering a fraction of the odds for the win, the numbers just don’t work anymore. Therefore the odds offered by the exchange are a much truer reflection of the odds on a horse placing, and much shorter than the bookie offers by default because of the combined nature of the each way bet. I hope that makes sense.

The things to look for in a bad each way race is a very very short favourite (about 2.8 and below), a couple of hopefuls (around 4/1ish) and a few complete outsiders (100/1+)

There’s a couple of ways to play these, either back and lay straight away, or you can back early and lay much closer to the off. The price almost always comes in sharply around ten- five minutes before the race and it takes nerves of steel (again not for newbies). You can also choose to fully lay to guarantee profit, or underlay to win more if you place and break even if you don’t.

The problem with this approach is the danger of non-runners, which are two-fold.

First, the bookie will apply “rule 4” which is where they will cut the odds AFTER YOU HAVE BET to take account of the fact there is less competition. This is fine if you have backed and laid at the same time as the exchange will recalculate as well. But if you haven’t, you need to take account of the reduction and lay accordingly. (the bookie will usually list how much they have reduced by on the race page). You can imagine the havok this causes when it happens 3 minutes out and you haven’t laid. It can save a lot of trouble to just underlay when this happens and hope you place.

Second problem is when you have a race with the number of runners on the threshold of the place market rules. A race of more than 8 will pay out on 3 places but if one or more horses drops out and the number of runners drops below 8, the place odds will drop to 2 BUT THE EXCHANGE WILL STAY THE SAME. I assume this is because people have bet on where it will place, so its not the exact same market. Similarly for a race with 16 down to 15 or less.

Handy guide to places:

Handicaps of more than 15 runners 1/4 4
Handicaps of 12-15 runners 1/4 3
All other races of more than 8 runners 1/5 3
All races of 5-7 runners 1/4 2
All races of less than 5 runners – win only

When things go wrong.
Betfair have various markets for various places, and even an each way market, so you might find a lay that is not too much of a loss should things go wrong. You can also keep an eye on what the horses SP will be and hope for a favourable BOG (possibly). Some bookies offer cash out as well.

Further reading:
https://matchedbettingblog.com/topic/my-theory-beyond-matched-betting/
https://matchedbettingblog.com/topic/ew-arbing/
https://matchedbettingblog.com/topic/early-prices/
https://matchedbettingblog.com/topic/the-bookie-angel-twitter/

HTH guys, and please chip in if I’ve missed anything.

+0

deathstar
25

February 1, 2017 at 12:01 pm

New to matched betting?

My Matched Betting Academy is the best place to get started. Learning the fundamentals takes 10-15 minutes and you’ll make £15 in the process.

Learning the fundamentals takes 10-15 minutes and you’ll make £15 in the process.

Learn Matched Betting

bobster 1 February 3, 2017 at 1:46 pm

@Chris – thanks for the example on the 13:15. Can you say whether you layed the win/place at the same time, or did you leave either/or till later on or in play?

Also what made you pick Moon Arrow and Mr Glob – why not some of the shorter priced horses who were technically more likely to place?

+0

mwilks 0 February 3, 2017 at 1:54 pm

I decided to cash in. Took the £10 loss.

Dont have the stones to be messing around inplay, especially at work.

+0

mwilks 0 February 3, 2017 at 1:55 pm

Just as a note. Obviously the cash out isn’t available at all bookies.

+0

Chris 19 February 3, 2017 at 2:02 pm

Moon i picked out this morning, his first race over hurdles so whilst he had no form, he didnt at least have bad form. The odds were close enough together to make it worth my while too, I layed the win immediately at 17, he came in to 16 at one point but just before the race drifted out to 26.

The place I gambled on, could have take 3.8 early on but decided to wait and hope for lower, unfortunately as he drifted out the place also drifted to 5. Rather than take the loss, I decided to lay in play as the race was almost 2 miles so he only needed to head to the front for a while for the lay odds to realistically come down to 3 or below. I could have waited even longer and got 2 or even let it run as a punt but played it “safe”.

Globe was just a horse I noticed a ton of money coming in for, his price really got smashed in 10 mins before the race. I was too late to that party though.

+0

Tony 12 February 3, 2017 at 2:03 pm

@mwilks Sensible, and not just because of the result. I think that some of these strategies require you to spend too much time staring at odds, which many people simply can’t do for a variety of reasons.

+0

Chris 19 February 3, 2017 at 2:05 pm

Also, that was not a good race to go for. Nothing suggested it would be a bad ew race, i.e the favourite wasnt super strong and there wasnt much to split the 2nd and 3rd fav with the rest being outsiders. I got on it because I couldnt find anything else and went chasing profit. I got lucky but on another day I would have left that race alone.

+0

Chris 19 February 3, 2017 at 2:07 pm

True Tony, and also you have to accept that losses are rare but inevitable. If you cant afford to risk £25-50 on a few occassions then this isnt for you.

+0
Get regular offer updates, tip and tricks, big offer alerts and more straight to your inbox.

Email*

CAPTCHA

Δ
MbPunter 18 February 3, 2017 at 2:16 pm

Good discipline to close out for a loss in my opinion. Pretty generous cash out offer too, given the drift.

+0

devans 0 February 3, 2017 at 2:25 pm

I got bad experiences of going in play. Backed a horse at 2.2 yesterday had a massive spike and continued drifting. As it being a short fav I let it go expecting it to come into around evens (at least) within seconds or the race it shot out to 8s.
Let it go and pouted all night and argued with the wife.
The joys

+0

Chris 19 February 3, 2017 at 2:26 pm

Different schools of thought. I think as you begin raking the money in, risk of losses become more acceptable.

+0

MbPunter 18 February 3, 2017 at 2:32 pm

Not against risking losses, i run all accas and value bet on some sports.

I think in this situation his bet had less worth than the £90 he was being offered.

+0

Lucida 0 February 3, 2017 at 2:36 pm

@fog_blog ‘This idea that because the lay price comes down close to the race – why don’t you trade it makes no sense. You can’t back the lay price.

In the morning the back price to place on the exchange will be something like 3.45 and the lay price will be something like 3.65. The money only comes in on the place market closer to the off so the odds tighten up to maybe 3.5 to back and 3.51 to lay. Its not like you can back at 3.65 and lay when it drops.’

Although you can’t back the lay price you can certainly join the queue in the hope of getting matched. I’m aware that trading will mean you will be losing value due to not getting BOG or missing out on the value place price at the bookie but in my eyes having a tiny edge purely on the exchange which can be scalable and sustainable is better than having a bigger edge with the bookie with no option to grow. (Unless you open endless multiple accounts of course).

I imagine you are well aware of this as you speak a lot of sense but I’m interested to know more on your thoughts of trading as an alternative. Mind you, if you could develop a profitable trading strategy you would be better off keeping it to yourself.

+0

FoG_BLoG 49 February 3, 2017 at 2:45 pm

Obviously the correct answer on a matched betting forum is to cash out and minimise the risk.

I am not sure his cash out offer was worth than his bet – if he was getting BOG on his bet or likely to get BOG and depending on the exchange prices he may have been able to lay for smaller loss. Surely the place price was still an arb.

I tend not to second guess myself, if I decided that a horse was value and I went for him without laying then I would be happy to let it run knowing lose some, win some. If your basing your value on something true then profit will come long term. I try to be decisive and stick to my principles. Instead of wavering, sometimes laying, sometimes not laying and what is bound to happen is your horse wins when you lay and doesnt when you dont – so its important to be consistent and decisive. All depends on your level of risk you want to accept.

+0

bobster 1 February 3, 2017 at 2:55 pm

@Chris – thanks for sharing your strategy on that one.

@Tony – agreed – this game is definitely for those among us with more time on our hands.

I’m sure @deathstar mentioned this in his first post, but I think it’s worth re-iterating to any newbies who have just jumped in at this point: this stuff is certainly not for people just starting out. @Chris’s post I refer to above being a good case in point – laying in play on horses. Stay with the standard promos for now and don’t worry about looking at this until you’ve exhausted those avenues.

+0

MbPunter 18 February 3, 2017 at 3:04 pm

Place Sp was 2.40/2.35. So only a tiny arb compared to 8.0/11.79 on the win.

I agree if you are running everything then that’s fine.

+0