Betting Guide » Online Betting Tutorial
Step 7 - Understanding Odds (Part 2)
Understanding Odds and using tools
Now that you understand a little more about odds and the different ways that they can be presented in, plus a better understanding of betting strategies in finding value and using money management, its now time to learn how useful a tool an odds comparison can be. Put simply, an odds comparison lists a host of different bookmakers which are offering odds for particular markets. By analysing the different odds provided by multiple bookmakers, you will be able to wager with the bookmaker that offers the best odds and find extra value.
Take the following example:
Here we see the Premiership market for the A-League Football for the 8 teams involved. We see that all six bookies are offering $3.50 for Melbourne Victory to win the title, but if you believed that Queensland Roar were good value and wished to wager on them, we see that Global Sportsbet are offering odds of $13.00 which is the highest price offered by the six listed bookmakers.
In Part 1 of this chapter we learnt that it is very wise to have multiple betting accounts with different bookmakers, 5+ being the ideal amount. By having funds in multiple betting accounts, using an odds comparison tool as per the example above can be a very powerful tool which can double your profits in the long run. If your betting often, then this can be a huge advantage that will allow you to gain large profits, more than you could gain by just using 1 or 2 bookmakers.
Odds comparisons are such a handy tool because it pits together all the odds from multiple bookmakers in an easy to read format allowing you to see the best value immediately. Could you imagine loading 10 different bookmaker websites individually and trying to compare the odds manually? It would be a very difficult task! It’s a known fact that odds vary a lot between bookmakers on different markets, the odds available on any selection can often vary by 50% in some instances! A small increase in odds will give you a large increase in profits overall, and this is a fact all punters should realise.
Bookmakers Overround
Another feature of odds comparison is a tool known as the ‘over round’. The bookmakers overround is how much a bookmaker stands to profit on each particular market. For a detailed analysis to help you understand more about this, click on the following link:
Totalisator Betting Pools
If you have been to horse racing tracks, or ever seen odds displayed on teletext etc, you would be well familiar with the term known as ‘betting pools’. A totalisator system pools together all the money wagered for each bet type of a particular race or event, then those punters who picked the winner of a particular event will be paid out with these pools. To learn more about totaliser pools, click on the following link:
