BET365 25% WINNINGS BOOST ON YOUR BET BUILDER

[Torque]

Backing Spain was the way to go. But even with that, losing was always possible.

[MCLARKE]

2 minutes ago, Torque said:

In the long run it'll always be better to back the favourites as the odds will be closer to fair, meaning that with the boost there's a chance to achieve +EV. Generally speaking, the bigger the bookie odds, the further away from fair odds. Can't remember which game it was during this international break, but it was one of the big teams against one of the minnows and the draw odds at the bookie were about 33 to 1. On the exchanges it was about 80 to 1.

Indeed it is. But as @harry_ragpointed out, the 25% boost is proportionately more the higher the odds. The trick is finding the sweet spot between this advantage and the favourite / longshot bias.

[harry_rag]

8 minutes ago, Torque said:

Backing Spain was the way to go. But even with that, losing was always possible.

The Racing Post did make a decent case for backing Scotland double chance which is why I was inclined to try and get the draw onside initially. I’d certainly be inclined to ditch automatically including btts as a component as I think it happens less often than you imagine and is probably over bet.

[Torque]

12 minutes ago, MCLARKE said:

Indeed it is. But as @harry_ragpointed out, the 25% boost is proportionately more the higher the odds. The trick is finding the sweet spot between this advantage and the favourite / longshot bias.

I realise that. But at the same time it stands to reason that the closer the odds are to fair to begin with, the more value can be obtained with the boost. Unless I've got my wires crossed somewhere.

[Torque]

2 minutes ago, Torque said:

I realise that. But at the same time it stands to reason that the closer the odds are to fair to begin with, the more value can be obtained with the boost. Unless I've got my wires crossed somewhere.

Maybe the best way to approach it is to compare the bookie odds with the exchanges, as there'll probably be some occasions where higher odds at the bookies are quite close to those on the exchanges.

It's got to be harder though to turn an -EV bet to start with - which most longer odds bets are at the bookies - into a +EV bet the further you are away from an +EV price to begin with.

[harry_rag]

7 minutes ago, Torque said:

I realise that. But at the same time it stands to reason that the closer the odds are to fair to begin with, the more value can be obtained with the boost. Unless I've got my wires crossed somewhere.

It’s tricky. A 25% profit boost is a decent offer but here we’re only allowed to use it on a specified match and in a market where we have to combine 3 components. Are we still best siding with the favourite if 365 offer the worst price of any bookie but are standout about the underdog? Should we be seeing which team is priced closest to the exchange price and siding with them?

I’m confident I could show a profit if I could use the boost on any market in any match, probably on any market in a specified match (as you say, find something as close to fair as possible). The 3-leg betbulider aspect definitely makes it more of a challenge.

[MCLARKE]

54 minutes ago, Torque said:

Unless I've got my wires crossed somewhere.

Given that the bonus is 25% of the winnings it also struck me that you're getting more a of an odds boost the bigger the price is, e.g.

• £20 at evens returns £45 equating to 2.25 (+12.5%)
• £20 at 2/1 returns £70 equating to 3.5 (+16.67%)
• £20 at 3/1 returns £95 equating to 4.75 (+18.75%)

So there's an argument for favouring bigger prices assuming the original prices all offer the same amount of value in relation to the "true" odds.

[Torque]

3 minutes ago, MCLARKE said:

Given that the bonus is 25% of the winnings it also struck me that you're getting more a of an odds boost the bigger the price is, e.g.

• £20 at evens returns £45 equating to 2.25 (+12.5%)
• £20 at 2/1 returns £70 equating to 3.5 (+16.67%)
• £20 at 3/1 returns £95 equating to 4.75 (+18.75%)

So there's an argument for favouring bigger prices assuming the original prices all offer the same amount of value in relation to the "true" odds.

That makes sense, but as I was saying the bigger boost relative to the odds isn't much use when the initial odds get almost exponentially worse the bigger they are, meaning that you're needing to clear an increasingly higher hurdle with the boost.

[harry_rag]

I think we're shooting at a moving target to some extent; if we had "x-ray specs" that allowed us to see the true price of every option we could pick the bet that was closest to being a fair price and back that but it would probably vary from game to game and be a short price sometimes and longer other times. In the absence of that there are a few options.

• Stick to a single bet for every game in the belief that it will be profitable in the long term with the benefit of the 25% boost. Seems to have been working for @MCLARKE so far, at least until I started chucking my 2p in! 
• Pick a bespoke bet for every game based on your opinion of how it will go, using what skill and knowledge you have (what I've been trying so far)
• Pick out a bet based on proximity of 365 prices to exchange prices, e.g. side with the team closest to the best price, the unders/overs line that is closest etc.
• Favour propositions that most punters don't like to bet, e.g. unders rather than overs, btts "no" rather than "yes" on the basis that those prices are more likely to be closest to fair.

It also occurs to me that there may be flaws or biases in their model for calculating the odds of the betbuilders. They may add more margin to some bets (making them harder to win with) but less to others. Though that's a very deep rabbit hole to go down, even if you can actually get the bet on with the offer!

I've got an idea for a quick experiment which I'm going to do now. Might be interesting and useful, might not, but I'll scratch the itch and post later.

[harry_rag]

50 minutes ago, harry_rag said:

I've got an idea for a quick experiment which I'm going to do now. Might be interesting and useful, might not, but I'll scratch the itch and post later.

Hang fire on that, no games of note today! Let me know the next game where the offer applies and I'll do it on that.

[MCLARKE]

1 hour ago, harry_rag said:

Hang fire on that, no games of note today!

How dare you, the mighty Owls are playing tonight !

[harry_rag]

1 hour ago, MCLARKE said:

How dare you, the mighty Owls are playing tonight !

Ok, I'm assuming the offer won't apply (twice in a week would be pushing it ) but I'll do the experiment anyway.

The idea was to do a bet builder of win/btts = no/<2.5 goals as that is essentially the team to win either 1-0 or 2-0. I thought it would make for an easy comparison between the betbuilder price and the actual price. It fell foul of the fact that 365 stripped the btts element out as Sheff Wed win and <2.5 only allows for 1-0 or 2-0 anyway (meaning we'd still need a 3rd element to qualify for the offer) put I've done it anyway.

1. 365 bet builder of Sheff Wed and <2.5 goals = 3.4
2. Add the 25% profit boost if available = 4.0
3. Same bet builder on Hills = 3.3 (every game where I've done a quick comparison with Hills the 365 odds have been better)
4. Dutching 365's odds for the 1-0 and 2-0 wins = 3.12 (interesting to note that the bet builder offers the better price)
5. Dutching the best prices on Oddschecker = 3.49
6. Dutching the prices on BF = 3.79
7. As an afterthought, I added >1 goal into the mix (making it a bet on 2-0) and ended up with 13/2 against their correct score price of 6/1

So, with a bet builder where we can do a direct comparison we get slightly better than exchange odds with the boost applied. Intriguing to get better odds that way than we would have playing the correct score market with 365. Part of my thinking was that people prefer to back overs and btts = yes so we might get closer to fair odds about unders and no.

I'm not sure that's of specific use on it's own but it's mildly interesting! It plays into my thinking that there are probably quirks within the betbuilder calculations (whether by accident or design) that add more margin to some calculations than others. Finding them is another matter though!

One other thought was, that for me, building a bet around an anytime goalscorer might be an option. 365 quite often offer standout and, I'd say, value prices about goalscorers. I'm in front on those bets this year (despite a poor month this month) and they're the most profitable bookie.

[MCLARKE]

2 hours ago, harry_rag said:

One other thought was, that for me, building a bet around an anytime goalscorer might be an option. 365 quite often offer standout and, I'd say, value prices about goalscorers. I'm in front on those bets this year (despite a poor month this month) and they're the most profitable bookie.

You could be right although I think when I looked at anytime goalscorer the overround was very high. I don't really have much knowledge about football betting so I probably wouldn't be able to find the value.

[harry_rag]

If they were best priced about the most likely scorer in the game at 2.3 or more you could probably assume the price was close to fair. I’m not suggesting that, in itself, as a profitable betting strategy but as an option for one leg of a betbuilder where the offer applies you could do worse. Shout when the next one is announced and I’ll have a look at it. I’d be interested to see if that unders/btts = no angle crops up again.

[MCLARKE]

I've had a quick analysis of the last 5 matches and the most profitable area has been where the odds have been in the range 5/1 to 11/1 with 5 wins from 14 bets and a profit of 38.5 points. This fits in with the logic that the returns should be higher as the odds increase but will be limited by the favourite longshot bias. Very small sample though.

[harry_rag]

@MCLARKE no game tonight?

[LEE-GRAYS]

18 minutes ago, harry_rag said:

@MCLARKE no game tonight?

It’s Burnley harry 20.00 k/0

[LEE-GRAYS]

9 minutes ago, LEE-GRAYS said:

It’s Burnley harry 20.00 k/0

I did this for bit of interest ?

[harry_rag]

I got my under 3 and under 2 goals mixed up so thought I'd found a crazy price then realised I'd messed up!

No play for me. Be good if someone could post a screenshot of the next one to show how you know what the offer is. I think they don't show up for me but it would be good to eliminate the possibility that I'm just not looking in the right place.

[Torque]

Should be the first thing you see on logging in @harry_rag

Banner at the top of the screen scrolls through offers. If you don't see this then I'm guessing you've been gubbed.

[MCLARKE]

3 hours ago, harry_rag said:

I got my under 3 and under 2 goals mixed up so thought I'd found a crazy price then realised I'd messed up!

No play for me. Be good if someone could post a screenshot of the next one to show how you know what the offer is. I think they don't show up for me but it would be good to eliminate the possibility that I'm just not looking in the right place.

Been out all day so missed today's (fortunately)

[LEE-GRAYS]

12 hours ago, harry_rag said:

I got my under 3 and under 2 goals mixed up so thought I'd found a crazy price then realised I'd messed up!

No play for me. Be good if someone could post a screenshot of the next one to show how you know what the offer is. I think they don't show up for me but it would be good to eliminate the possibility that I'm just not looking in the right place.

Chelsea villa today just under icon at top you can scroll through it for over offers 

[harry_rag]

1 hour ago, LEE-GRAYS said:

Chelsea villa today just under icon at top you can scroll through it for over offers 

Cheers, looks like I can’t see the offers then (on the basis of them not being available to me). Not in the app at least, I’ll check the desktop site later.

I’m thinking Chelsea win, Havertz to score and >2 goals today at 5/1. You can get 15/2 if you prefer btts to >2 goals.

The low goals angle doesn’t appeal as 365 are best price about 1-0 and 2-0 so you get a worse price in the bet builder for Chelsea and <2 goals. Their 12/5 for Havertz is a massive standout which looks worth taking on its own merits.

[MCLARKE]

I'l go with you today Harry, I'll get entertainment for the full 90 minutes (unless Havertz is subbed without scoring)

[alexcaruso808]

Chelsea aren't playing so well . 

[MCLARKE]

Yep, that didn't go to plan although Villa win full time and half time and over 2 goals at 11/1 did fit into the 5/1 to 11/1 range

[harry_rag]

7 minutes ago, MCLARKE said:

Yep, that didn't go to plan although Villa win full time and half time and over 2 goals at 11/1 did fit into the 5/1 to 11/1 range

It would’ve been a loser though, unless you mean over 1 goal? I’m not sure there would be much mileage in following 9/2 underdogs to win that easily nor that you would get close to fair odds for it. Just one of those things. 

Not sure if Havertz gave me much of a run for my money but Watkins was 4/1 and has seriously outrun his odds this season. At least I was right about Chelsea and under 3 goals not being a bet! 

[MCLARKE]

Yep, apologies, I meant over 1 goal at 11/1

[MCLARKE]

Sunday's match is Newcastle v Man Utd

Newcastle, BTTS and over 3 goals is 15/2

[LEE-GRAYS]