With the new Premiership football season fast approaching it’s time to investigate some interesting methods for trading football matches on Betfair. Basic bet trading on Betfair is simple. It’s a case of back high, lay low, or vice versa, lay low and back high. Simplicity in itself. Those unfamiliar with Betfair and or trading on Betfair might not find it such a piece of cake. Take a look at the Betfair FAQ, and, how to make a Betfair trade, for a better explanation.

Successful goal betting is all about have good information and stats that reveal which games will produce goals and which won’t. Trading goal bets is a good way to profit from this information. As long as the odds move in a predictable way then a trade can be made. The difficult bit is knowing which matches will be football gold (that’s profit in the pocket) and which will be a bore.

The followiing stats can be very useful for selecting which football matches to trade;

Stats for 2 goals or less and 3 goals or more.
Average goals per match.
Time of first goal.
First team to score.
Both teams to score.
Clean sheets.

Using this information is very useful when deciding which games to trade on Betfair. Some traders like to use a strict set of rules when it comes to trading football games. However, something we prefer and as I have noticed on the forums of Bet Trader, many other traders prefer is to adapt rules to specific games.

If you know a certain team often gives matches where there are less than 2.5 goals in a game it’s wise to adapt your bet trading strategy accordingly. Take a game where you know there will not be many goals, for example, Fulham who produced less than 2.5 goals in 68% of their away games in the 2010 / 11 season. Fulham’s home games still produced an average of 2.2 goals per game. So, there’s a good chance there will be goals but not more than 2.5 goals.

A bet trading strategy to adopt on Betfair would be to trade the 2.5 goal market. This is a good market to trade because there is lots of liquidity on Betfair on this market: especially ‘in play’ (the ‘2.5 goals’ market is one that most traditional bookmakers price up).

So how can a bet trading strategy be adapted to this sort of match?

Betfair odds follow patterns that repeat themselves regularly. The longer a game progressives with out goals being scored the higher the odds will move for an ‘Over 2.5 goal’ result. Naturally because the change of getting more than 2.5 goals decreases. When a goal is scored the odds for an ‘Over 2.5 goal’ result shorten, by different amounts depending on how much time is left. A good trading strategy would be to place a lay bet on the ‘Over 2.5 goal’ result as soon as the first goal is scored: after the odds shorten. As the game continues the odds will lengthen. A corresponding back bet is placed at larger odds in order to secure a profit.

What happens if a second goal is scored quickly?

At this stage there would be 2 goals scored. The bet is not lost but the odds could be a lot lower producing a loosing position. The trade can be closed for a loss. Or the trader can hang on until the loss reduces or break even is reached (balls of steel time).

This strategy can be used in reverse. Choose games that are likely to produce more than 2.5 goals. Look at the ‘Under 2.5 goal’ result. The odds should be longer because lots of goals are expected. Wait for the first goal. The chances of ‘Under 2.5 goals’ will decrease and the odds will increase. After the odds increase place a back bet. As the game continues without a goal the odds will start to decrease. It will probably take about 10 minutes. Place a corresponding lay bet to secure a profit after the odds shorten.

Simply this goal bet trading technique involves using the stats to select a game, using the trading rule of lay at low odds and back at higher odds for a profit. Profits will roll as long as there are more winning trades than loosing ones. By using the stats the trader reduces the chance of loosing trades.

Some readers might be wondering how it’s possible to do bet trading on Betfair. A feature of Betfair trading software which is essential for goal trading is the ability to hedge bets or to ‘green up’. Let’s Compare Bets highly recommends Betfair software from Racing Traders which does all the calculations automatically so the trader doesn’t need to work out what stakes to place. Making the process on bet trading easy. It’s free. A premium version is available which provides faster speeds and more features, but, the free version is good for practice. Visit them here. Use the forum to get other trading ideas and get advice from traders.

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