Value Betting

Value Betting

Value betting is the ability to identify an edge against a bookmaker. If a bet is priced incorrectly, then it offers value. Below we talk through value betting, why it’s a great approach for successful betting and how Sports4Cast helps you do just that. 🤑

Value is a common concept also used in financial investing and the same approach can be used for sports betting – if a bet’s probability of occurring is less than it should be, then there is an opportunity for a value bet 🔥. Don’t worry if that sounds complicated! We’ll talk through it all below with a worked example and it should all become apparent.

Successful bettors and traders understand the difference between the chances of winning a bet and how they compare to the odds available. To be a successful bettor you need to identify value bets and bet on them regardless of how likely or unlikely it is to happen.

Placing a value bet is not as simple as looking for odds on the favourites. You should never bet just on who you ‘think’ is going to win the match – instead you should look for matches in which you think the bookmakers have got the odds wrong, or ‘mispriced’ the match. These are opportunities.

Yes, the favourites is more likely to win than not, but that doesn’t mean they always offer value. The key to long-term successful betting is understanding the probability of an outcome accurately and identifying where the market is out of line.

Probability is the likelihood of an event happening – displayed as a percentage. Betting involves assessing the probability of that event happening – from 0% (impossible) to 100% (certain). Bookmakers are inherently trying to measure that probability and translate it into odds. 🔢

The opportunity for value betting occurs when the odds available are not a true reflection of the probability of the outcome occurring.

Worked Example

Imagine a match where each side has an exactly equal chance of winning – a true 50:50 (ignoring the draw for now). The odds being offered here should be 2.0.

If you bet on this match 100 times (and each side did actually win 50 times each) then you would remain on £0 at the end, neither making profit nor a loss, as you would win £1 fifty times – winning £50 total – and lose £1 the other fifty times – losing £50.

However, let’s say instead the odds offered were actually 3.0 rather than 2.0. This time every time you won you would make £2 instead of £1, and over the course of the 100 matches you would win £2 fifty times – winning £100 and only lose £1 the other fifty times – losing £50. In this situation you would end up £50 in profit at the end. This is a value bet. ✅

Bookies Odds

However, the bookies never offer ‘fair’ odds. The bookies always ensure that the odds are in their favour by adding in their profit margin to both sides of the bet. This is why in all matches and outcomes, their odds never add up to 100% (you can see this across our site). In the above example of the 50:50 match, the odds they would offer would likely be 1.90, instead of 2.0. Therefore over the course of the 100 matches, you would end up down £5. This is not a value bet. ❌

So if bookmaker’s odds are inherently unfair, how can we ever turn a profit?

Estimate Your Own Odds

Like analysts investing in the stock markets, bettors should assessing your own probabilities for an event using all information available to them. By then converting these to odds, you can compare them to the bookmakers odds and notice if a match is undervalued or overvalued.

Thinking in Probabilities

The aim of value betting as we now know is to assess the likelihood of an event more accurately than bookmakers. To do this it is vital you think in probability and assess both teams chances of winning – not just looking to back favourites.

Sports4Cast Betting Analysis

At Sports4Cast we do just that. We have probabilities for thousands of matches and events happening across the world. We then pull in odds for all these matches and events. And as part of our Betting Analysis Services, we compared the two of them to identify any mispricings and value bets. You can see that entire process in the image below 👇

• Assess the probabilities (F4C % column)
• Convert to odds (Value Threshold column)
• Look at bookmakers odds (Best Odds column)
• Identify value (Colour coding – green / red / yellow)

This allows you to easily scour the markets every day and quickly and easily see where value exists.

Each match is assessed based on the odds we have found and whether they are above or below the Value Threshold. The best odds are published and colour coded to show whether these odds are value or not.

Going Further

However, our analysis is not infallible. We do sometimes get it wrong (unbelievable I know!). Therefore you should also assess the outcomes and probabilities, and add your own knowledge on top to assess whether a match is truly value or not, and therefore whether it is worth a bet.

Premium Analysis

If you want to take things up a level and see how our Premium Analysis uses the Kelly Criterion and league specific information to make specific match recommendations, tailored to maximise profit and minimise risk, check that out here.