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Guide to Sports Betting And Tips
What is sports betting?
Let’s start with the basics. A bet (or wager) is defined as money placed to predict the outcome of something, with a return on your investment if you’re right and no return if you’re wrong. In the sports arena this comes to mean the outcome of a sporting event, or an element therein.
The sports betting industry at a glance
The hugely profitable sports betting industry is said to be worth as much as $1 trillion US dollars a year worldwide, a quite staggering amount that demonstrates just how popular betting on sports has become to both casual punters and betting experts alike. There are an increasing number of experts for whom sports betting has become a full-time and highly profitable profession.
What sports can you bet on?
You can bet on any sport you like, providing a bookmaker is offering odds. Sports betting is completely legal in Australia, so you can freely place a wager on cricket, rugby, tennis, golf, Australian Rules football, soccer and many other sports beyond. Horseracing has traditionally been a staple of sports betting and continues to attract huge sums gambled every year.
How do you place bets?
There are three main ways to place a bet on a sporting event in Australia – in person, by phone or via in the Internet.
If you want to place a bet in person you would visit a licensed bookmaker, either on the high street or at the sporting arena (such as a racetrack), and fill out a betting slip detailing your bet and the stake you want to put up. This slip is then submitted to the bookmaker.
Some bookmakers allow you to place bets by phone, which would follow the same process aside from you explaining your bet to an operator and likely funding the bet with the use of a credit or debit card (sometimes linked to an account you’ve previously set up).
Betting via the Internet is growing in popularity by the year and is now a huge business by itself. After setting up an account with an online bookmaker you can enter your bets via their site and fund them with a card linked to your account – or by using another accepted payment method.
Sports betting with your mobile device
Many of the leading online bookmakers now offer mobile functionality, to allow punters to place bets via smartphones and tablets on the go. Mobile betting can be accessed either with the download of an app or simply by accessing the bookmaker’s site while connected to the Internet on your mobile device.
How do odds work?
Betting odds illustrate the amount you can win in relation to amount you put on as a stake. Odds of 10-1, for example, would mean a bet of $1 would pay a return of $10 if it came to fruition. You also get your initial stake back, so a $1 bet at odds of 10-1 would see you collect $11 from the bookmaker.
How much should you bet?
This very much depends on your financial means, but a good rule is never to bet more than you can afford to lose. It’s important to budget carefully and set yourself limits on a weekly or monthly basis, to avoid getting yourself into debt.
What types of sports bets are available?
The type of bet available depends somewhat on the sport you’re betting on, with the nature of some sports lending themselves to different markets.
That said, most sporting events will have a basic betting market for predicting the outright winner – be it the winner of a soccer match, a race of some kind or an entire tournament for that matter, such as the World Cup.
Spread betting takes things to the next level, with punters asked to predict the score of sporting contests, or finer details such as the amount of runs scored by a particular team or batsman in cricket. The bookmaker sets a line and the bet is to predict which side of that line the score will fall on.
Accumulator bets involve predicting the outcome of a number of sporting events in the same wager. This is deemed very difficult to do, so the odds are high and there can be a lot of money to be won if you’re right.
Some sports betting websites offer in-play betting, where markets adjust as a sporting event is happening and you can jump in whenever you feel there’s a good wager to be had. It’s worth noting in-play betting is illegal in Australia.
How to research your sports bets
Nobody ever got rich from sports betting without putting in hours and hours of painful research to stay as informed as possible. To have any chance of winning regularly you have to know your sport inside out and have studied the mechanics of it in detail.
The most effective sports betting experts develop their own systems and formulas for success, and they consume as much sport as possible. You might have the odd win as a casual punter, but the only way to win often is to study the form.
How to bet on sports most effectively
It goes without saying you’re going to perform best betting on the sports you know most about, but just being a clued-up super fan isn’t enough. You need to add a deep knowledge of the betting markets to your understanding of the sport if you want to collect regular winnings.
How to choose the bookmaker you bet with
It’s a crowded market and there is plenty of choice when it comes to choosing a bookmaker to bet with. If you’re betting online it’s worth paying close attention to the offers/promotions out there, as some bookmakers will give you a free bet to get started.
Longer term, of course, you need to be aware of the bookmakers offering the most attractive odds in relation to the sport(s) you want to be betting on. Some are more generous than others, and some are stronger on some sports than others. The key is research.