Football betting - is there any point to it?

[Maxi Stavros]

Well it is coming up to the end of the European football season, luckily we have the Euros to look forward to this summer. 

For me it has been a really poor season, I ended the season £900 down, I usually bet £20 on a Saturday, £20 on Sunday and maybe £10 on midweek days where there are plenty of fixtures.

I usually bet on team goals, sometimes singles, other times fivefolds, sixfolds. I started betting on these type of bets as the win bets have got harder and harder over the years IMO.

Over the years I have focused on BTTS bets, over 2.5 goals, over 0.5 first half goals, teams to score over 0.5 or 1.5 goals. I cannot get any of these to be profitable long term.

I followed some of the online tipsters on Twitter this season, not to place my bets but to record how they do. The annoying thing with these tipsters is that they never keep profit/loss records, they make a big song and dance when they win but barely mention a bet when it losses. The tipsters I followed had very poor seasons too.

IMO football betting is not beatable. I have bet for the last 20 years, I love football, I know so much about football, I watch loads of football, it's why I bet on it, I feel like when I look at a fixture I can predict how it may go. But it doesn't seem to go like that. I mean take Man Utd v Arsenal today, I fancied Arsenal to score over 1.5 goals, the odds were only 1.44 but United who have been awful this season and with so many players out injured looked like they would really struggle today. Arsenal had managed over 1.5 goals in 7 of their last 8 away games, only failing to do so at Man City. But it failed. In recent weeks matches like Leeds at home to Sunderland, Leeds at home to Blackburn looked like home bankers but Leeds failed to score in both.  Who would have though Liverpool would lose at home to Palace, at home to Atalanta? Who would have thought Aston Villa would lose home and away to Olympiacos? The annoying thing is, when I go for larger price bets they never seem to win. A few weeks ago I had a bet on Chelsea over 1.5 goals at Arsenal at what seemed very appealing odds of 4.80. I had watched Arsenal lose at home to Villa 0-2 the previous week and had seen Chelsea score 2 or more in their previous 6 league matches. Of course it ended up 5-0 to Arsenal.

Anyway, you don't need me to go on about my losing bets but what I am trying to get at is that football matches are so unpredictable but at the same time so hard to win longer odds matches. 

The reality is that the odds on any outcome on a football match are so brilliantly set, the exchanges are of course the best odds and where to bet to maximise value but the fact that they are so accurate means that in reality long term you will only ever break even. If the odds are set accurately then aren't you basically just betting on luck? There is a match about to kick off shortly, Strasbourg v Metz, I fancy over 2.5 goals in this match. It is a game Metz have to win, a draw is no good. Both teams are far from solid, both teams seem to let goals in but seem capable of scoring too. Odds on the exchanges are 1.96 on over 2.5 goals. If these odds are very fair and accurate, what is the point betting on it? These odds suggest that 51% of the time you will win, 49% of the time you will lose. The odds seem fair. The chances of me winning is the same as having a bag of 100 balls, 51 being winning balls and 49 being losing balls and picking one out at random. If I win it is purely luck. What is the point of betting on luck? Would I bet on a coin to be heads at 2.0? Would I bet on picking out a heart from a deck of cards at 4.0? Would I bet on black in roulette for 2.0 if there was no zero? What is the point?

Obviously the only way to make profits is to find value but if the odds are set accurately then there can never be any value. If you do find value, can you find value thousands of times over to make it worth your while? How do you know if you even have found value and that you can find an error in how all of the bookies and exchanges have set the odds? 

Football betting is nothing more than betting on luck. If you cannot make money from it, what is the point?

 

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30 minutes ago, Maxi Stavros said:

sometimes singles, other times fivefolds, sixfolds. I started betting on these type of bets as the win bets have got harder and harder over the years IMO.

Football betting is nothing more than betting on luck. If you cannot make money from it, what is the point?

 

If win bets have got harder and harder as you say here, then multiples will have got harder too, but to a greater degree.

If you cannot make money from it, what is the point?
If your sole aim is profit, then of course there is no point.

My advice, FWIW is stick to single bets,
bet for enjoyment,
limit yourself to one bet per betting day,
If you're struggling to find a 'best bet', don't bet that day at all.

Most hobbies cost money, collecting stuff, subscriptions, club memberships, etc. Enjoy pitting your knowledge & skills against the available odds in a limited way, you may find your hobby costs very little, could break even, or you never know it might start to pay if you can be disciplined.

Profiting from football win singles is possible, and very enjoyable. There can be a point.