Football betting 101 – the 1×2 markets:

If you have a good understanding of the sports aspects of soccer, it’s going to be easy to learn how to bet in the most popular markets.

The 1×2 market is very simple. Let’s use a real-life example to explain it. In the upcoming Champions League game, between AC Milan and Chelsea, on October 11th, 2022, these are the current market odds.

AC Milan – the hosts – victory: 3.11
Match Draw: 3.46
Chelsea – the visitors – victory: 2.35

The hosts are always represented by the number ‘1’ in the sportsbooks’ websites, as well as odds comparison websites.

The match draw is represented by the X, like matches are displayed at times, AC Milan x Chelsea in this case. The visitors are represented by the number 2.

Decimal odds – football betting

The numbers you see associated with each team are the odds. They determine the prize a player can win if he or she chooses to bet on that particular outcome.

Let’s simulate some betting scenarios below.

In each scenario, we’ll see the potential prize if we bet £100

AC Milan – the hosts – victory: 3.11 * £100 = £311 (potential prize)
Match Draw: 3.46 * £100 = £346 (potential prize)
Chelsea – the visitors – victory: 2.35 * £100 = £246 (potential prize)

As you can see, betting on different outcomes could bring home different amounts of profit.

That reflects how the market sees each team, i.e., the market considers the victory of Chelsea more likely to happen than the victory of the hosts. The match draw, in this case, is considered less likely than the victory of both teams.

Fluctuation of Odds: football betting guide

Just like a stock market, the perception of the betting markets changes according to the reality of the league, the teams, and even things like the weather or rumors of fights between players or between the manager and a particular player.

For that reason, if a bettor likes the odds of the market, he or she needs to buy it if he or she really wants to bet, because the odds may drop and the bet may not be that attractive.

How to know if a soccer betting odd is good enough

If you are a bettor that is just betting for fun, you can do whatever you want as long as you bet responsibly and the betting losses don’t affect your life negatively. If you want to profit in the long run, then you need to learn concepts like fair odds, and value bets, and how to calculate these things precisely. We’ll publish betting guides about these topics very soon.

Now that you learned a bit about football betting, check other articles about football with betting insights like our latest analysis about Neymar’s future, the Belgian International selection, and Cristiano Ronaldo in the World Cup.

You may also want to check our brand new guides about Asian Handicap and Over/under goals betting.

Keep an eye on our home page and the blog for new betting guides and betting previews every week!