Markets Explained

	Your skill is selecting the correct scores, but bookies' odds offer useful pointers as to the most likely outcomes

The world and his dog knew that Arsenal would beat Sunderland when the sides met at Highbury in the Premiership on 5 November. At a best price of 2/9, it would take a huge bet to get rich simply by backing the Gunners to win.

In situations such as these, when the favourite is so prohibitively priced, tipsters will often recommend fiddling with the firstand last-goalscorer markets, but the most savvy and dedicated bettor will look to other forms of betting in order to get value. One option that’s often overlooked is correctscore betting.

Before you baulk, allow me to explain what’s essentially a simple system, but one that requires time and patience if you’re to thrive. It’s often argued that correct-score markets are the preserve of the mug punter, with so many possible outcomes in a game of football, picking the exact score of a match is at first glance very difficult indeed. This is reflected in the odds. You’ll typically see correctscore prices around as follows: 1-0 at 6/1, 2-0 at 13/2, 2-1 at 7/1, 3-0 at 10/1, 3-1 at 10/1, 3-2 at 33/1 and so on.

However, the betting system I recommend is based on selecting the three or more most likely scorelines in a given match and staking proportionately on each, so as to reap the exact same pay-out no matter which, if any, of your selections wins.

You should use this system when one team is a short-priced favourite to beat another. In the example above, Arsenal went off at home to Sunderland at a very short price for an obvious reason: there was a gulf in class between the two sides. The odds on the favourite to win by two or more goals were also odds-on, which is a reflection of the likelihood that Arsenal would win the game by two or more goals. Given Sunderland’s lack of attacking prowess, especially away from home (going into the game, they had scored four goals in six matches on their travels), it was reasonable to assume they would struggle to score more than one goal.

In odds we trust

By backing correct scores of 2-0, 3-0 and 4-0 in Arsenal’s favour, you could procure equivalent odds of almost 7/4. If you wanted to take a more conservative approach, adding 3-1 and 4-1 still offered odds of a shade better than evens.

Sure enough, Arsenal triumphed 3-1 and those following the system and covering all five of the aforementioned scorelines won at odds almost five times better than those who simply backed Arsenal to win the fixture (2.02, or a shade above evens, compared with 1.22, or 2/9).

Choosing those correct scores is, of course, the hard part. The system is designed for use when the favourite is such a short price that even odds on a handicap win (usually by two goals or more) are unappealing. Continuing with the Arsenal vs Sunderland example, the Gunners were a top-price 8/11 to overcome a -1.5-goal deficit, which would have put off plenty of punters.

There’s more than just guesswork involved in picking out the correct scores to back. The above-mentioned five correct scores covered all Arsenal victories with the Gunners scoring between two and four goals – statistically the most likely outcome – and Sunderland scoring zero or one. If you were convinced Arsenal would win the game, and by two or more goals, the system would have let you effectively bet that they wouldn’t score five goals or more. The beauty of it is that you can tinker with it to fit your own predictions. For example, you may have felt a 5-0 scoreline was more likely than a 4-1 result, and so you could have included that selection.

The next stage is working out the stakes. After all, it’s vital that you receive the same pay-out should your bet win, no matter what the scoreline of the match – otherwise, you’re favouring one scoreline over another.

This is the equation
B1 x O1 = B2 x O2
However, B2 = T - B1, so substitute in
B1 x O1 = (T - B1) x O2

When you solve this for B1, you’re left with B1 = TO2 / (O1-O2), where:
T = Total stake £100
B1 = Stake on correct score #1
B2 = Stake on correct score #2
O1 = Odds of correct score #1
O2 = Odds of correct score #2

Confused? The equation for three or more selections is slightly more complicated, but it’s just an extension of the above equation. When you have three selections, you first perform the equation for two of them – that is, you find the combined odds, and then use those odds with the third odds, and so on for four selections.

In recognition that not everyone will be able to follow the above equation – not all us gamblers are maths experts – we’ve provided an Excel spreadsheet that does all the maths for you, which you can download from the forums on this very website. Simply input your total stake and the odds of each correct score as a decimal.

Out with the accas

By using this correct-score system to obtain odds of evens and above, we’re making single bets on the match far more appealing than straight bets at odds of 2/9 and below. What’s more, we’re eliminating that common urge to build an accumulator using a strongly fancied selection. Many people, seeing the short odds on Arsenal, would have built it into an accumulator in order to get a bettervalue pay-out. The Arsenal part of the ‘acca’ may have come off, but how many punters will have had no return on the Arsenal game because another selection in the acca fell down?

Your skill is selecting the correct scores, but bookmakers’ odds themselves can provide useful pointers as to the most likely outcomes. Arsenal 2-0 was the shortest price of all correct scores in the Sunderland example. This is usually the case when a team is a heavy favourite to win a given contest, with 1-0 and 3-0 being the next shortest prices.

As regards match selection, the most important trend bettors should look out for when deciding whether or not to use this system is the weaker team’s goalscoring record. The system is often a bet on a certain team to win to nil. The odds on the win-to-nil market, which are offered by several bookmakers – for example Bet365 – should be checked before using the system, but picking a range of correct scores is almost always a better-value play than the special. For example, Arsenal were 4/6 to beat Sunderland to nil, so a variety of correct-score bets proved better value.

An alternative to the correct-scores system – known as the Gugan Formula, after the mathematician who provided the programming for it – is to focus on the unusual Goal/No Goal market. Currently offered by very few layers, most notably Eurobet, it allows bettors to wager that either both teams will find the net, or just one will fail to do so. For example, a 2-1 scoreline would result in Goal winning, with a 1-0 result meaning that No Goal backers win.

Given that our system is so often in effect a bet on the favourite to win to nil, it’s worth looking at the quotes about No Goal, as they can sometimes offer better value than the win-to-nil special. An advantage of both these markets is that they’ll win should the favourite run riot, as was the case last month when Chelsea thrashed Real Betis 4-0, thus meaning that backers of the three likeliest Chelsea win-to-nil scorelines (1-0, 2-0 and 3-0) would have lost.

All of this goes to show that there’s plenty of value in games with short-priced favourites as long as you know how to find it.