What is Sports Betting?
Online sports betting is a pastime enjoyed by millions the world over; some even make a living out of it. If you’re new to it all and want to at least understand the basics, keep reading as we’ll bring you up to speed on how it all works. By the time you’ve finished reading, you’ll be ready to open an account and place your first bet.
How to Read Betting Odds
Kicking off our sports betting guide is an explanation that at its core, all betting is a game of maths and sports betting is no different.
At the heart of that are the odds that the bookmaker lays on all the different selections in a betting market. And the odds generally come in three formats.
Fractional
Fractional odds are mostly only used in the UK these days. Of the three types of odds, these are the ones that you’ll see less of at online bookies.
A bet where you’re staking 5 units to win 5 units of profit is known as evens and is expressed as 1/1.
A bet at 4/1 means that if you staked 1 unit and it won, you’d profit by 4 units. With fractional odds, the odds don’t include your stake if the bet were to win, so in the case of a 4/1 winner, you’d get paid four times your bet, plus you’d also get your stake back.
Not all fractional odds are nice, round numbers.
A bet at 8/11 means that if you staked 11 units and it won, you’d win 8. In other words, the second number in fractional odds (the one after the /) represents the stake you need to bet in order to win the first number.
Decimal
This is probably the most common form of odds, widely used in Europe (including the UK), South America, and sometimes even in the US.
A good starting point is to understand that 2.0 is evens (see above), anything above 2.0 is odds-against, and anything below 2.0 is odds-on. Odds-against means you’ll win more than what you staked; odds-on means you’re staking more than what you’ll win.
Unlike with fractional odds, your stake is already included in the odds. So, a 5.0 shot (4/1 in fractional odds) will win you 5 times the value of your bet, but that includes the stake you’ll get back if it wins.
If the odds were 1.8, you’d win 0.8 units for every 1 unit wagered. Plus, get that stake back, of course.
American
Unsurprisingly, these are the odds most commonly used in the US. First up, American odds always use a baseline value of 100 dollars.
The second thing to bear in mind is that odds with a minus sign in front of them are odds-on; you’re risking the amount of money before the minus sign to win 100.
Those with a plus sign before them are odds-against. It assumes you’re risking 100 dollars to win the amount after the plus sign.
So, a bet that’s -135 means you’d have to wager 135 dollars to win 100. A bet that’s +250 means if you wagered 100, you’d win 250.
Understanding Betting Markets and Types
Before you start to bet on sports, it’s advisable that you understand the difference between betting markets and betting types. That’s what we’re discussing in this part of our guide to sports betting.
Examples of betting markets are: the winner of a basketball match, how many goals there will be in a football game, a player to hit a century in cricket, or who will win Wimbledon. In other words, betting markets relate to what aspect of the event you’re wagering on.
Betting types, or more precisely types of bets, relate to the format of the bet itself.
A single is a straight wager on something happening or not happening. It’s the most basic type of bet.
A double means wagering on two separate outcomes in the same wager and needing both to win.
Both Teams to Score (BTTS) bet is when you wager on whether both teams playing in a match will manage to score.
Accas are the generic name for any bet with more than two selections in it. Trixies and patent bets are examples of special bets where the more of the selections you get right, the more you’ll win. Bet Builders are a form of acca, but one where all the selections are from the same match.
So what is spread betting? It’s another type of bet where you either go high (buy) or low (sell) on a particular outcome (e.g. the number of goals in a football match). The more right you are, the more you’ll win. But the more wrong you are, the more you’ll lose.
Understanding Betting Strategies
If you want to learn how to bet on sports successfully, there are lots of dos and don’ts to it. An advanced guide to sports betting will cover many of those in detail, but one of the key elements is to have a good betting strategy.
One is what’s called value betting. The concept of it is that you take higher odds than what you think the selection should be, irrespective of whether you fancy the selection to win or not.
Another is hedging. That could involve betting on, say, a tennis match and placing an odds-against bet with Bookie A on Player A and then betting on Player B with Bookie B also at odds-against. Whatever happens, you’ll always win.
Sensible bank management is another form of betting strategy. It means you should never risk too much of your bank on any one bet and that you vary your stakes based on how much you fancy that particular bet.
Betting on Sports
Unlike casino games, which rely mostly on chance (with a bit of strategy), sports betting is more complex because it relies on humans, horses or greyhounds performing in a particular way.
Sports betting rewards the true experts with good betting strategies more so than casino betting does.
These days, you can bet on just about every sport under the sun, from the mainstream ones like football and racing to the more obscure ones like surfing, squash or curling. A key tip, though, is to focus on two or three that you’re a real expert at, rather than five or six, some of which you might not be such an expert at.
Betting on Competitions
Football betting, for example, is broken down into hundreds of different competitions, from the Premier League or Champions League to the Saudi Arabian Premier League, Copa America or World Cup.
When it comes to cricket, the best Sportsbooks will have odds relating to all of the most important domestic and international competitions across all three of cricket’s formats.
The same is true of all the other sports. Similar to being an expert on a few sports and not trying to master them all, it’s preferable to be very knowledgeable on a few competitions than having a basic understanding of lots. Sometimes in sports betting, less is more.
Signing Up for a Sportsbook
A crucial element of how to bet on sports online is understanding how to go about actually opening an account and getting your money in and out of it.
Registration
Choose a sportsbook from our list of recommended betting sites that ticks the most boxes in terms of what’s important to you. That could be one that has particularly high odds across the board, offers the most sports to bet on, offers the most bonuses, or has popular betting features that you enjoy.
Next up, click on Join/Sign up, and enter all the information asked of you, such as your name, date of birth, e-mail address, mobile number, home address and a username for your account.
Depositing
Once your account is set up, it’s time to put some money into it. Go to the Banking section, choose ‘Deposit’ and select from their list of payment options. Most sportsbooks will accept a mix of debit cards, bank transfers, and e-wallets like Skrill and PayPal, while some also accept cryptocurrencies.
Once you’ve decided on a payment option, choose the amount you wish to deposit. Most deposits are instant.
Withdrawing
When you’ve won some money and want to withdraw it, here’s what to do.
Go to the Banking section again, but this time select ‘Withdraw.’ Choose the payment option you want to use. Many of the same options available to deposit should be available for withdrawal, too.
However, some betting sites insist that you need to withdraw using he same method as the one you used to deposit. So, if you deposited using PayPal, you’ll need to also withdraw with PayPal. Choose the amount you wish to withdraw – all of your funds or a portion of them – and process the withdrawal.
It will take between a few hours and five working days for the money to reach you, depending on the payment method and the bookie in question.
How to Place a Sports Bet Online
Now that your account is set up and funded, here’s how to go about placing a bet. Let’s say you wish to place one on Chelsea vs. Liverpool in the Premier League.
- Navigate to the column of the homepage where all the sports are listed.
- In this case, you want to select football (or whichever sport you’re betting on).
- All the different football competitions will now be listed. Seeing as it’s Premier League you want, choose it.
- The upcoming Premier League games will be displayed. Go to the Chelsea vs. Liverpool match.
- Click on the market you want to play. For example, if you wish to place a bet on a player to score anytime, navigate to the anytime scorer market.
- All the players will be listed with their respective odds. Select a player you believe will be one of the scorers in the match.
- Choose your stake and process the bet.
Ready to Hit the Bookies
So that’s your lowdown on what different types of odds mean, the various betting markets, the sports and competitions you can bet on, some tried-and-trusted betting strategies and how to go about opening and funding an account, withdrawing from it and actually placing a bet. Now it’s over to you to put all you’ve learnt into practice.
