There has never been so much choice when it comes to the range of online betting markets offered by the bookmakers. Sometimes a bookie will even offer customers the chance to build their own bet, while there’s also the option to choose between pre-match betting markets or wait for the game to kick-off and then enjoy In-Play betting odds instead.
In this article, we look at the most popular football betting markets and explain the advantages of choosing each one. Please note that you’re often able to enjoy Cash Out when it comes to these options, with customers potentially able to make a profit without actually backing a winning selection.
Full Time Result (1x2)
The Full Time Result betting market is also known as 1x2 and this remains the most popular option when it comes to a football match.
It’s a very simple case of choosing between the home team (1), the away team (2) or the draw (x) when it comes to placing a bet.
Let’s say you think the home team are going to win a football match and they are available at odds of 2/1 (or 3.00 if you’re using decimals).
A £10 bet on the home team would potentially see winnings of £20 (£10 x 2) along with your £10 stake back.
It’s always a three-way market when it comes to football betting, with this also being popular with customers wanting to place a Full Time
Result accumulator where you can combine different selections and get multiplied odds as a result.
Indeed, you will often find a 1x2 accumulator coupon with your favourite bookmaker and it’s a simple case of tapping on the teams and looking
at the various multiple bet options which includes accumulator.
Ideally, you want the percentage payout to be as close to 100% as possible, with bookmakers usually taking some kind of house edge although
many will bet competitive odds when it comes to leading football competitions such as Premier League, Champions League and Serie A.
Double Chance
Double Chance is something that you’ll see featuring prominently on football coupons, with this providing customers with the opportunity
to effectively bet on the 1x2 market but have two of the three options available.
As with the Full Time Result market, there are three options although two of these options will be settled as a winner and that means
that the odds are a lot shorter on the Double Chance market than you’ll find with 1x2.
Case Study
Let’s say Norwich are playing Chelsea. You might find the following options:
- Norwich or Draw = evens
- Draw or Chelsea = 1/5
- Norwich or Chelsea = 1/4
Note: This kind of football betting market is ideal for those that want some kind of insurance.
Let’s say you have a fancy for Norwich but also
want to profit if the match ends all square. This might be the perfect opportunity to then bet at even money and you would win as long as
Chelsea didn’t win.
Alternatively, you might go for one of the shorter-priced options if you think that Chelsea are likely to win but want to have another
option on your side.
Correct Score
While Full Time Result and Double Chance are 3-way markets, the same can’t be said about the Correct Score betting market.
As we all know, football matches end with all kinds of scorelines and that is reflected in the huge range of betting options available,
with customers able to bet on as many as they want.
If you think that a football match could be a tight encounter, you might want to look at betting on a 1-0 or a 1-1 scoreline although
anyone wanting to bet on a goalless draw should swerve this market and back “No Goalscorer” on the First Goalscorer betting market
instead as own goals don’t count here.
Sometimes a betting customer might combine Correct Score bets and go for 1-0 and 2-0 with a view that the home team are likely to keep
a clean sheet and win the game by either of these scorelines. However, the more bets you choose on the market, the more your potential
winnings are diluted.
When a football match goes In-Play, customers can also bet on a market called Final Score, while there is also the option to bet on
Half-Time Score should you want to bet on a shorter-term market. Some bookmakers such as bet365 also have Half Time / Full Time
Correct Score markets.
Half Time / Full Time
There are nine different betting options when it comes to the Half Time / Full Time football betting market. This is where a customer
needs to predict what the 1x2 outcome will be at half-time and what the 1x2 outcome will be at full-time.
Returning to the Norwich v Chelsea example, we could have any of these scenarios:
- Norwich – Norwich 6/1
- Norwich – Draw 14/1
- Norwich – Chelsea 20/1
- Draw – Norwich 9/1
- Draw – Draw 11/2
- Draw – Chelsea 4/1
- Chelsea – Norwich 33/1
- Chelsea – Draw 14/1
- Chelsea – Chelsea 15/8
The first part refers to the 1x2 outcome after the first half, while the second part refers to the 1x2 outcome at the final whistle. Therefore,
if you think that favourites Chelsea are going to be ahead at the interval and end up winning the match, then you would back the 15/8 about the
Blues on the Half Time / Full Time market.
We like to use this betting market when we want to back the favourite to win a particular football match and would rather take a bigger price on
this market than the alternative of simply betting them on the 1x2 market instead.
Alternatively, you might think that a team could make a potentially fast start before their opponents come storming back in the second half although
the odds reflect the fact that this is less likely to happens as it relies on more goals being scored.
Goals Over / Under
Many people like to eschew markets such as Full Time Result, Double Chance and Half Time / Full Time as they all rely on customers predicting the outcome
of a particular football match. What if you don’t have a strong opinion on which team will end up winning?
That’s where an Over / Under Goals betting market comes in. This market doesn’t need you to predict which team will win or even score the goals during the
match. It simply relies on a customer being able to forecast whether the match will be high-scoring or low-scoring.
Many punters like the fact that an Over / Under bet is generally a two-way market so it theoretically gives them more chance of winning. A standard betting
market will be something like this:
Over 2.5 Goals 4/7
Under 2.5 Goals 11/8
Don’t be confused by the mention of 2.5 Goals as we all know that half a goal doesn’t exist in football. Betting on Over 2.5 Goals simply means you are backing
three or more goals to be scored during the entirety of the football match.
Conversely, betting on Under 2.5 Goals means you are betting on two or less goals to be scored by the final whistle. Using the above example, the bookmaker is
expecting it to be relatively high-scoring and you can get a bigger price about the second option.
Bookmakers will also offer alternative Over / Under bet and sometimes there is a huge range of options so you can effectively back your own view. So for example,
in the Norwich v Chelsea game, you might get the following:
Over 3.5 Goals 6/4
Under 3.5 Goals 8/15
Here you can see that the “Under” option has now become the favourite on this market. If you think there will be three goals or less in the game, you would bet
on the 8/15 although the Over 3.5 Goals option could be perfect for those customers who expect a high-scoring encounter and are prepared to take a punt on four
or more goals being bagged.
Effectively, you can choose your own Goals Line with this bet and the odds will adjust according to whether you want to back Over or Under a certain amount.
You can generally bet as low as 0.5 Goals and as high as 6.5 Goals.
Both Teams to Score
This is a really straightforward football betting market. If you think both team will score during the ninety minutes, you would choose the “Yes” option.
Alternatively, if you think that at least one team will fail to score, you might select the “No” option.
Please note that both teams failing to score would also see “No” as the winner, with many customers referring to this market as BTTS. Many customers also
like to do a Both Teams to Score multiple bet such as an accumulator where you can select a number of games and apply the “Yes” or “No” option for each one.
Goalscorers
Many betting customers like to bet on a certain player to either score first, score last or simply find the net during the ninety minutes.
A bookmaker such as coral will provide a full list of players who could be involved in an upcoming match and they will create a First Goalscorer,
Last Goalscorer and Anytime Goalscorer list.
As you can see, the First Goalscorer and Last Goalscorer price are usually the same about a certain player, while Anytime Goalscorer is a shorter price.
As the name suggests with the latter, it doesn’t matter when your player finds the net in order to win with your bet.
A First Goalscorer bet means that you need your player to be the first name on the scoresheet. If the first goal is an own goal, then you can still win if
your player scores the second goal. Similarly, Last Goalscorer means that your player must score the last goal of the game.
Asian Handicap
Many customers enjoy an Asian Handicap bet, with bookmakers tending to bet to competitive margins as far as this is concerned. These betting markets are
slightly more advanced although they can be very rewarding once you get the hang of them.
A typical Asian Handicap betting market might look something like this:
- Norwich +0.5, +1.0 @ 1.840
- Chelsea -0.5, -1.0 @ 2.060
So this is effectively a two-way market where you choose between the options available. Choosing Norwich would mean that half your stake goes on the Canaries
with a 0.5 goal start and half your stake goes on Norwich with a 1 goal start.
The stakes are split in a similar way if you bet on Chelsea who are regarded as the outsiders in this market as they have to overcome 0.5 of a goal to win the
first part and 1 goal to win the second part of your bet.
There are also Alternative Asian Handicap lines which can sometimes be a little more straightforward. For example, you might get this:
- Norwich +0.5 @ 2.025
- Chelsea -0.5 @ 1.775
In this example, a bet on Norwich would effectively mean you win your bet if Norwich won the match or the game ended in a draw. That’s because they are being given
a fictional half a goal advantage over Chelsea.
Similarly, Chelsea would need to win the game in order for your bet to profit. It wouldn’t matter whether they won by a single goal or more – as long as they were
the winners come the final whistle.
Draw No Bet
The Draw No Bet market is great for customers who want to eliminate the draw from their betting, while also having the insurance of getting money back should
the game end all square.
So a typical Draw No Bet market might look like this:
Norwich 2/1
Chelsea 4/11
This would mean customers can bet on Norwich at 2/1 knowing that a draw would see them get money back. This is ideal if you have a view on the match
but don’t want to risk betting on the 1x2 market.
Result / Both Teams to Score
If you have a strong fancy for a football team to win a match along with an opinion over whether both teams will score or not, then this could be the market for you. This market is especially good for strong favourites if you think that they will keep a clean sheet as part of the equation.
Betting on a team + BTTS No is essentially the same as backing that team to win to nil. Alternatively, betting on a team + BTTS Yes means that you need that team to win their game and for their opponents to find the net. You can also select the draw + BTTS as part of the equation and this provides a good alternative to the main markets.
Goal Line
The Goal Line offers a simple choice between two betting options. For example, you might get to either bet Over 3.0, 3.5 at 2.040 or Under 3.0, 3.5 at 1.860. If you were making the first bet, then you would need four goals or more in the game in order to win your bet.
However, this bet is effectively splitting your stake equally between Over 3.0 and Over 3.5. That would mean half the stake back if there were exactly three goals in the game and punters like this sort of bet as it provides some kind of insurance.
Corners
There are now lots of corner-related bets available with bookmakers. This might include a three-way market where you have the option to bet on Over 9 Corners, Exactly 9 Corners or Under 9 Corners. Naturally, the middle option is trading at the biggest odds.
There might also be a Total Corners market where you can choose between five different options such as Under 6, 6-8, 9-11, 12-14 and Over 14. This is sometimes described as margin betting and it gives you a few options to shoot at.
Handicap Result
Handicap Result is generally a three-way betting market, which might be Preston +2 @ 1.83, Tie -2 @ 4.00 and Liverpool -2 @ 3.00. Customers simply have to choose from these options and it’s great if you have a strong opinion that the outsider or the favourite can perform better than the odds suggest.
Bet Builder
Many bookmakers now provide customers with the option of placing a Bet Builder on a football match. This essentially means choosing a number of selections for that game and combining them together in a same-game multi. You can often get a big price for a relatively small stake by going down this route.
Cards
There are often lots of cards-related markets and it starts with Number of Cards in Match. This can be a two way market where you either bet Over or Under a certain number of cards being awarded. You can also bet on whether both teams will receive a card and also specify a certain player to be booked during the match.
Result / Total Goals
This is a great way of backing a team but getting a much bigger price than you would find on the Full-Time Result betting market. It might be that you want to back Manchester United to win and Over 3.5 Goals in the game or alternatively you fancy Chelsea and Under 3.5 Goals. Both of these options include a wide variety of possible scorelines.
Half-Time Result
As the name suggests, this is a case of betting on the outcome of a match at half-time. You bet on either the home team, away team or the draw as part of the bargain. You can also bet on markets such as Half Time Double Chance and Half Time Result and Both Teams to Score.