Football Arbitrage

Arbitrage betting – also known as arbs, surebets, miraclebets and surewins – is a technique in which you place bets with different online betting companies in order to cover all of the outcomes of a sporting event to guarantee yourself profit.

Arbitrage Betting Explained. Arbitrage betting works by placing a wager on all possible outcomes of a given game. Because the NFL really only has two outcomes (Team A win or Team B win), arbitrage betting is a bit easier than it would be if you wanted to bet on soccer or any other sport that can end in a tie. As we’ve already explained, arbitrage betting involves placing bets on all the possible outcomes of an event in order to guarantee a profit. In a tennis match, for example, you would place two bets – one on each player to win. In a soccer match you would place three bets. Again, there are other ways in which one can conduct arbitrage, but this is the classic example. Fantasy Arbitrage. Fantasy arbitrage as originally theorized and presented by Fantasy Douche is/was the practice of basically “trading the spread” between two highly similar (and commoditized) fantasy assets.

An arb arises when betting companies take an alternative view on the outcomes of a particular sporting event, meaning that they offer different odds to reflect the probabilities. Should you find a situation where bookies disagree by a large enough variance, you could lock in profit regardless of which outcome win.

Because of how a bookie sets their prices, you are guaranteed to lose money if you bet on each outcome within an event at the same bookmaker. For example, backing the favourite to win, underdog to win and the draw in a football match would ensure the bookie rubs their hands with glee as they take your hard-earned cash. This is because the betting company includes an overround in their pricing which gives them an edge as it replaces the true odds of each outcome with their own odds (You can read more about probabilities, odds and overrounds here.

However, comparing the odds for the same sporting event from different betting companies can open up an opportunity because the bookies have an alternative view, or may have made an error. This doesn’t mean that a favourite with one bookie becomes the underdog at another, more that there will be a slight difference in the odds that are on offer.

For example, BetVictor could price a Floyd Mayweather Jr win at decimal odds of 1.48 (67.6% implied probability) whereas 888Sport could think he’s even more likely to win and offer odds of 1.36 (73.5% implied probability). As a result, the price on his opponent would also change between the two bookies and mean that backing the underdog could see a range between 2.75 (36.4% probability) and 3.25 (30.8% probability). If the numbers add up correctly, you could find that backing Mayweather with BetVictor and his opponent with 888Sport could automatically put you into the green no matter who won the bout.

As shown in this boxing example, generally there is only a slight difference between the prices set by bookmakers. This means that you need to bet with high stakes in order to make any serious money as arbitrage bets typically range between 1% and 10% profit. This could mean that a £1,000 stake would return as little as £10 and as much as £100 which may not be worth the vast amounts of time taken to identify the surebet in the first place. Although the likes of online bookies and odds comparison sites have helped the punter identify arbitrage opportunities, it also means that the bookmakers themselves can use them to spot pricing mistakes or identify if there odds are drastically different. This means that the opportunity for arbing is less than it once was.

Software and bots do exist which identify arbitrage opportunities, however I’ve personally never used them so couldn’t comment on their effectiveness. Instead, we’re going to look at how to find arbitrage bets using a manual process, which is actually relatively simple to do, it can just be time consuming. The process is as follows:

1. Using an odds comparison site such as Oddschecker, find a sporting event which offers two outcomes.
2. Find the highest odds available for each outcome from two different bookmakers.
3. Calculate whether the odds represent an arbitrage betting opportunity.
4. If so, calculate the individual stakes you need to bet with at each bookmaker.
5. Place each of the bets.

To explain this process further, let’s look at a real-life example of a surebet based on the step-by-step approach above. As context, I went to Oddschecker, and after a little while of searching, came across the ATP Indian Wells tennis tournament which had Andy Murray (1.18 highest with Boylesports) as the favourite to win the match against Vasek Pospisil (7.00 highest with SkyBet). Why did this match grab my interest? Well, let me share the below table which gives an indication of the odds you’re looking for to potentially identify a surebet.

After noticing that 1.18 and 7.00 looked like a potential arbitrage bet by looking at 1.20 and 6.00 above, the next step is to calculate whether the odds actually represent a surebet. Luckily, there are plenty of online calculators available which do all of the hard work for you. However, we can take a look at the actual calculations to see how things work behind the calculator.

Firstly, if not using an online calculator, you need to work out the arbitrage percentage which identifies whether you have a surebet. As mentioned above, with an individual bookmaker, the total percentage of all outcomes in a sporting bet will add up to greater than 100% due to the overround. Therefore, we are looking for opportunities where all outcomes from different bookies add up to less than 100% as this suggest that the bookies have different opinions on the outcomes. To calculate the arbitrage percentage, you can use the following formula:

Arbitrage % = ((1 / decimal odds for outcome A) x 100) + ((1 / decimal odds for outcome B) x 100)

Football Arbitrage Software

Andy Murray Win: (1 / 1.18) x 100 = 84.746%

Vasek Pospisil Win: (1 / 7.00) x 100 = 14.286%

84.75% + 14.29% = 99.032% (less than 100%, therefore an arbitrage bet)

Having found a surebet, we then need to calculate the profit we will receive based on the amount of money we are willing to invest. If, for example, you are wanting to place £500 stake on the tennis surebet above, you would calculate the profit using the following formula:

Profit = (Investment / Arbitrage %) – Investment

Football Arbitrage Betting

(£500 / 99.032%) – £500 = £4.89 profit (from £500 stake)

The next step is to calculate how your investment needs to be broken down in terms of stakes across both bets. This is so that you are returning the same profit regardless of which outcome wins. The idea is to return the same profit regardless of whether the first or second outcome is successful, so it is critical to use the correct stakes – if not, you could find that one outcome is more profitable than the other or that you actually lose money if one outcome wins. To calculate the individual stakes:

Individual bets = (Investment x Individual Arbitrage %) / Total Arbitrage %

Andy Murray Stake = (£500 x 84.746%) / 99.032% = £427.87

Vasek Pospisil Stake = (£500 x 14.286%) / 99.032% = £72.13

£427.87 + £72.13 = £500 total stake

You therefore know that to make £4.89 profit from £500 (0.968% profit) you need to place a bet of £427.87 on Andy Murray to win at odds of 1.18 and £72.13 on Vasek Pospisil to win at odds of 7.00. As you can see, this is quite a lot of work for less than £5.00 profit, but as mentioned, online calculators can take a lot of the manual work away from this process.

As an aside, it is also worthwhile knowing how to calculate the stake for outcome B if you know how much you plan to bet on outcome A. Rather than the above approach where we split the total stake (£500) into two bets to guarantee the same profit, we can work out how much to place on outcome B if we have bet £500 just on outcome A. This can be done using the following formula:

Stake for outcome B = Stake for outcome A x (Odds for outcome A / Odds for outcome B)

£500 x (1.18 / 7.00) = £84.29 stake for outcome B

To work out total profit, you would then use the above figures in the following calculations:

Profit if outcome A wins: (stake for outcome A x odds for outcome A) – (total investment)

Profit if outcome B wins: (stake for outcome B x odds for outcome B) – (total investment)

If Murray wins: (£500 x 1.18) – (£500 + £84.29) = £5.71

If Pospisil wins: (£84.29 x 7.00) – (£84.29 + £500) = £5.74

So, by investing £584.29 in this match, you would make a profit of £5.71 if Murray wins or £5.74 if Pospisil wins.

As described above, we’ve talked about finding surebets by looking at online bookmakers and odds comparison sites to identify the best prices for each outcome in a sporting event. This isn’t the only arbing opportunity though – it is also possible to do this via betting exchanges and in betting shops. For instance, you could use the likes of Betfair to back and lay a bet to create a guaranteed profit – along similar lines to trading in the financial markets – although an extra considerations is that you need to factor in the commission for using the service. Similarly, there is also the practice of ‘sharbing’ where you are able to create an arbitrage opportunity by using an online bookie for one outcome and a betting shop for the second as shops are usually slower to respond to price changes than online bookies.

Although arbing is not illegal per se, it is viewed very negatively by bookmakers and can often result in bets being cancelled should it be detected. This can have a knock on effect if a bet on outcome A is cancelled with bookie A, but outcome B is not cancelled with bookie B, meaning that you could be seriously out of pocket considering the large stakes at play. Going one step further, it is also not uncommon for betting accounts to be suspended if people are suspected of using surebets. Therefore, heed a word of caution when approaching arbitrage betting despite the promised guaranteed profit on offer.

Ready For More?

Football (Soccer) is a sort of an arbitrage betting heaven, if for no other reason then for the sheer number of games, especially the ones that are played when the European football season is played. Bookmakers are unable to pay attention to everything – and this is where the happy go lucky arbitrageurs have all the necessary conditions to step in and take the best out of all opportunities! The majority of the soccer matches offer a grand variety of markets that can be combined creatively and wisely in order to create what is commonly known as synthetic arbs. Several examples of such football arbitrage deals have already been mentioned in the above texts, but soccer as sure as a gun offers a lot more possibilities of this nature than any other sport, considering that occasionally there can be over twenty markets intact. Never has there been a sport that could make so many rearrangements and transitions feasible! Do pay extreme attention to soccer, especially upon the European season. You’ll definitely find yourself looking at some infinite vista.

Before we start discussing all those opportunities and facilities in earnest, we should talk about the so-called Asian Handicap, the far Eastern form of making a bet that is the most notable one when it comes to soccer games. Right now, as you are reading this material, this format is rapidly becoming one in great request all over the world. And, certainly, you remember about the importance of staying aware at all times!

The nature of such betting must be quite obvious from the name itself: the strongest team available receives a handicap, which makes the field a little more leveled. A half-goal, that is impossible to score, lies among the most widespread handicap types. Because of that, the result of the game will clearly be an “either-or” one, without any remote possibility of the teams coming to a draw. When there is a handicap, there always will be a clear winner; there are plenty of people who consider such a situation to be a cause for a better value, but it cannot be claimed completely true. Even so, an Asian Handicap really unbars opportunities for a vast quantity of markets – which, in turns, provides more novel surebet possibilities!

Here is one of the most simplistic examples of implementing the Asian Handicap situation in terms of arbitrage. In this case both teams are quoted with a minus or a plus after their name and before the necessary number. It looks approximately this way:

Man U -1.5
Arsenal +1.5

In order to place a bet on the first of these teams and win here, Man U will need not only to win the game, but to score at least 2 goals more than Arsenal. Obviously, there will be no draw; in terms of betting, whatever the outcome the situation is ‘win or lose’. But in the same scenario there is a source of confusion, and this is how it looks:

Man U -0 & -0.5
Chelsea +0 & +0.5

This is a quarter, or, to use the complete name, a ‘Quarter-goal Handicap’. In such case whatever bet you make is divided in two. If you bet on Manchester United, both of your bets will win whatever number of goals this team scores. But if in real life the game comes to a draw, half of your bet will be refunded. However, if Man U loses, you get nothing out of your bet.
We are explaining the nature of the Asian Handicap here because most sports arbitrage deals related to soccer include this phenomenon. You can see how important it will be for you to understand it once you’ve chosen to become a keen arbitrageur. This is not the kind of betting you are allowed to overjump.

Synthetic Arbitrage

There will be a multitude opportunities in arbitrage trading for you while the soccer season is on, including the ones that will be pretty much straightforward. They can be related or unrelated to the Asian Handicap, found easily through arb services or manually and with less ease. Soccer is quite fluid, giving lots of possibilities with the exchanges and bookmakers alike. There are arbitrageurs who only come into the big game at the time of soccer season, get plenty of surebets and end up earning enough to have no reason to bet for another year. But, of course, this is not very easy. It takes up plenty of hours of tireless trading, finding unobvious, curious arbitrage possibilities and so on, and so forth. If you decide to follow the same venue, you’ve got to have the utmost confidence in what you are doing – and then you can be more successful in any other sport, at any other given time. If you commit yourself to arbitrage betting with soccer amidst the season and turn your attention to the biggest sharks among the players, you can receive twice as much income as when you use other opportunities, with other sports and other seasons.

Here are some opportunities that come up when some of the soccer markets are intact. First of all, let us review the markets that are always on offer. They are the 3 markets of Asian Handicaps, the Corners market, the Correct Score market, the Half Time/Full Time one, Half Time Score, Match Odds, Next Goal, about 4 markets of Over/Under, the Odd or Even Score market, the market of Red and Yellow Cards Totals, the curious market of Shirt Numbers (total of goal-scoring shirt numbers), the Time of First Goal one, and, finally, last but certainly not least, the Total Score market. As you can see, soccer can provide all the necessary ground for some fantastic synthetic sports arbitrage deals. For example, the market of Correct Score can be combined with Asian Handicaps as well as Match Odds, or maybe the Odd/Even Score market, or the Over/Under one. Because of the unique variety of possibilities it takes a lot of attention and effort in order to act properly. Synthetic arbitrage betting probabilities, as it has been already stated throughout our arbitrage lessons, never gets spotted by the arb services machines – which is hypothetically bad because of the hardships of finding them, but in the long run is very, very good because such deals are always a lot more long-lasting. You just need to make certain that the two markets you deal with are interlinked. For example, sports arbitrage between the Shirt Numbers market and the Corners one will not ever be possible, but combining the Time/Full Time and Match Odds markets is all good.

Middles

Soccer also provides plenty of middles opportunities whenever there is a total and there are bookmakers whose opinions regarding this total do not tie up. The Cards market is especially rich in those. For example, the bookies can give 10 points for a player receiving a Yellow card and 25 for a Red one. Then there appear more variations: 30 points exactly, less than 30 points, more than 30 ets. It can also look differently: less than 21, 21-48, more than 48. Some variations may be even more complex: 0-10, 11-20, 21-30, 31-40, 41-50, 51-60 and over 61. Eventually, there you get three markets that can be luckily combined in order to receive more creative opportunities for middles and arbitrage trading. If you combine the formats 1 and 2, you can have yourself a fairly easy arb. It will look just about so:

Book 1
Less than 30 1.91
Precisely 30 6.00
More than 30 2.20

Book 2
Less than 35 2.0
35-50 2.50
More than 50 4.00

Betting on More than 30 with the first book and on Less than 35 with the second amounts to a 4.75% surebet whatever the outcome.

Middles, we remind you, are not unique to soccer. NFL, cricket, rugby, snooker and all other sports that involve totals are all ready to welcome arbitrageurs and other bettors with some high-return possibilities.

Bet/Lay Arbitrage

Here we should talk again about the arbitrage trading possibilities related to the exchanges and making lays there. You can sometimes stumble upon such fortunate chances out of sheer need, like when you see some kind of potential arb through Arbitrage Pro or any similar program, and that arb involves placing three bets (away, home and draw, all classical ones). You may see this as a fairly simple kind of surebet and head straight forward in order to place your funds everywhere – but then you find that you have only catched a single possibility out of the necessary number, say, backing one of the teams at 1.61. Then you are bound to be looking for other trade balancing possibilities. In this situation it can be godd to have a look at the exchanges such as Betfair. If you manage to lay the same team there at 1.42 securing yourself a great load of money in case of the team’s loss.

Here is a clear example of a sports arbitrage deal made with the help of Bet and Lay. You go to Book 1 and bet 500 pounds there for the favourite at 1.61. Then you head off to the Exchange with their 2.75% commission and lay the very same team at 1.42 with 575 pounds. Congratulations – you’ve secured yourself a certain 63.50 pounds worth profit!

First of all, this situation is nothing out of the ordinary. Secondly, there is hardly an arb seeking service that will show you such a golden opportunity. Even with the exchanges commission, the arb from the example above is clearly an about 9% one. So, the importance of such deals in the delicate matter of arbitrage betting can never be understressed.

Accumulators

Here is another perfectly valid form of sports arbitrage for you: accumulator bets. Such kind of bets requires you to put a double, triple or larger accumulator and then head to an exchange in order to lay off. The common opinion is that only mugs would back an accumulator, so if you follow the described method you are likely to push the bookies off your trail.

To make it all work, you’ll have to find several extra hours in the middle of the events and use them for getthing your exchange-related lays on. It is best to do this in the first days of the week, reckoning on the weekend matches seeing that throughout the week the price of the favourites can b e decreased. It would be good for you to understand the soccer stats at leas a little; such knowledge could give you a supplementary advantage, helping to use some higher-than-reasonable prices to your greater benefit.

Even when you are aiming for a surebet it is, naturally, best to have the most insight into the world of sports you can get, even if you are only going to exploit it in the process on picking the player/team to bet on. As it has been stated already, each of the sites available on the web has its own format, including some very inconvenient, bird’s-eye ones. So when you are looking for some kind of not-so-popular team in a distant corner of the world, you can waste time that will deprive you of your great arbitrage betting opportunity.

Now, let us continue our small talk about accumulators. Once again, we are going to give you an object lesson in these undergoings. Say, you’ve got three teams belonging to the class of favourites. You’ve got a bookie and the prices this bookie gives for said teams. You like the prices so far and know that you probably aren’t going to care for them in the same fashion once the week moves to the end. All the games involving the teams you’ve picked are going to occur throughout the weekend, starting at least with a 1-2 hours interval. Well… that’s a nice ground for an accumulator deal! Now, see how it is going to look like:

Bookmaker
Team 1 1.70
Team 2 2.00
Team 3 2.10

Here you can place a 200 pounds worth triple deal with the bookie and wait somewhat. In a few days you’ll find that Team 1 will be priced 1.62 at the exchanges – a good reason to lay this team at 213 pounds there. Even taking a 2.75% commission into account, that is a profit of 13 pounds already. Now, if Team 1 wins this weekend, the bet will go on. If not – well, you’ll still have 13 pounds of profit.

If the Team 1, though, you can place 340 pounds onto the next one – Team 2, which will cost, say, 1.90 at the exchanges by then. Go on, lay it by 363 pounds – and there is your sure thing 17 pounds of profit! If you’re lucky and Team 2 wins, as well, you’ll have 680 pounds to bet onto Team 3. As said team is going to cost, well, something like 2.02 at the exchanges at that moment, you can lay it by 743 pounds. Voila – regardless of the outcome of the last game in a row you’ll have your extra 50 pounds of pure profit.

Yes, of course, all this complex arbitrage trading could be easily reduced to three individual arb deals, but do trust that betting in triples can be extremely useful when you feel like you’d like to alter the bookmaker’s perception of your gambling self a little. With practice, you will notice that bookies who monitor their own data closely will be finding you a bad client more and more, cause an avid, keen arbitrageur is always a hazard for this business. You don’t think that it’s only a casino that can track a certain betting pattern, do you? And if they do find out that you’re a threat to their wallets, you’ll see for yourself how hard it will be to get any reasonable bet of yours going, not to mention that you’ll have to wave goodbye to all the tasty bonuses.