Can You Pick A Winner More Often When Handicap Betting At Bet365 Sport?

What type of betting do you enjoy the most? Are you someone who has cut their eye teeth betting on traditional win or each way bets on horseracing or similar, or are you someone that first got into betting by placing accumulator bets on a number of football match results?

Maybe you came into betting in a different way, perhaps placing multiple bets, such as Full Cover Bets or Full Cover With Single Bets. You may even have started, though it is unlikely, from trying out Banker betting at Bet365.

What is certainly true, is that regardless of how you came into betting, there is now a far greater choice of bets available across a wider range of sports than ever before. This gives punters far more flexibility when they join a site like Bet365 (which you can do by clicking here to realise your Bet365 no deposit bonus) but that also means punters need to explore what markets are available when it comes to trying to remain profitable.

One of the most appealing types of bet to punters seeking regular profits is Handicap betting and there is a good reason for this. In this article, we’ll explore just why punters like handicap betting, what handicap betting is, how it is presented on the site and how potentially profitable it could be to you.

Handicap Betting – An Explanation

As the name implies, handicap betting is a form of betting where the team or individual you back is given either a positive or negative handicap based on the ability that team or person possesses compared to their opponent.

The handicap is usually calculated in terms of the scoring unit of the sport. So for example in football, the handicap is expressed in goals, in tennis it will be sets, American Football it would be points and so on.

The general aim of the handicap is to offer a handicap to your selection that will make the match up as close to an even money bet as possible. This is best explained by way of an example.

Let’s say for example, Manchester City have been drawn to play minnows Accrington Stanley in the FA Cup Third Round. You would like to place a bet on Manchester City, but find that the odds available in the Match Result market are so short, that there is little value doing so.

In this case, you check the Handicap Market and find that you can back Manchester City to win with a handicap of -2.5 goals at 10/11. Whereas you can back Accrington Stanley to win with a +2.5 goal handicap at the same price of 10/11.

What does this mean? Well it means that in order for your bet to win, you must apply the handicap stated onto your chosen selection and then check the result following the applying of the handicap, to see what the new score is. This new score, will then be the one the outcome of your bet is based upon.

Let’s now say you back Manchester City at odds of 10/11 and they win the game 3-0. If you apply the handicap of -2.5 goals to the scoreline, that would still mean a Manchester City win of 0.5 goals to 0. This means your bet would win.

However, if Manchester City won the game 3-1, or 2-0 for example, when the handicap is applied, the score would either be 0.5 v 1 or -0.5 v 0 in which case, Accrington Stanley would win once the handicap is applied and your bet would lose.

The simple and important thing to remember with any type of handicap bet is that the handicap is only applied to your selection, not both selections. If you remember that, then handicap betting is as simple to follow as any other form of bet.

How does handicap betting look on Bet365?

We have already explained that handicap betting are based on the unit of scoring in the sport that the bet is being placed on, but in addition to that there can be different types of handicap bet. To highlight these examples, we are going to stick to football betting. Firstly, because it is easy to follow handicap betting on this sport and secondly, because many handicap bets are placed on football.

• Asian Handicap – This form of bet was made popular in the Far East and the aim of the bet is to remove the draw option, by having a handicap which means only two results are possible, either Team A will win, or Team B will win. This is achieved by awarding handicaps that include half or even quarter goals.
• Game Line Betting – Although you can find these bets on football, they are more traditionally used on US sports, particularly Baseball, Basketball and American Football. These are handicaps similar to Asian Handicaps and can be full point or half point handicaps. The greater the handicap applied to each team, the greater the difference in ability between the two.
• Football Handicap Betting – This is a handicap bet that uses full goals as handicaps, which means that the draw outcome is still an option (unlike an Asian Handicap bet). Therefore there are three possible bets you can make for this bet, Team A to win, Team B to win or the draw.

Why is handicap betting popular?

Handicap betting is popular for two reasons, firstly, it offers punters a chance to back a rank outsider, or a hot favourite without either having to take either very short, or very long odds. Handicaps level the playing field, or in theory they try to, so that you can get better value on your bet (if you back a strong favourite) or a much better chance of a win (if you back a strong underdog).

However, another important reason why Handicap betting is popular is that handicapping is not an exact science. Often, when a bookmaker handicaps a selection they may offer too big or too small a handicap and astute punters can learn to recognise this and find some great value options in handicap betting markets.

This is particularly prevalent in the Far East and North America, where handicap betting is more widespread and where tipsters will devote hours to picking out the match ups where the handicaps applied are perhaps not quite reflective of the strengths of the two teams.

By being able to recognise these games where one team has been handicapped to a greater or lesser extent than they should have, you can target your betting on the market that is most likely to win and thus, handicap betting can be a profitable way to bet.

Could I make a profit targeting handicap betting?

Like all forms of betting, you can make a profit handicap betting, but in order to do so, you’ll need to hone your skills and learn when a team has been over or under-handicapped and exploit this by betting on the right selection.

For example, in the selection above, let’s say that instead of having a -2.5 handicap, let’s say Manchester City were handed a -4.5 handicap and Accrington Stanley a +4.5 handicap.

This means that for any bet on Manchester City to win, they need to win by five clear goals. Even against weaker opposition, that is a big ask. Therefore, the bet on Manchester City isn’t as appealing as backing Accrington Stanley here, hence, if you wanted profit, you’d take Stanley as your selection here.

On the other hand, if City’s handicap was -0.5 and Stanley’s +0.5, then City only need to win by two clear goals to win the bet, hence backing them makes far more choice here.

You can place all different types of handicap betting at Bet365 Sport across a wide range of sports right now.