Critical thinking is one of the most important features when it comes to sports betting. World is full of bullshit and your job is to recognize it. Just remember how many times you saw any so-called experts coming out with predictions about the stock market, elections, politics or match result. The next thing we see is the same people explaining the reasons why the outcomes were different than predictions without – all this without a glimpse of humility. In the following text I will describe some of the myths I got in contact with.
Fixed match information
First of all. If you have information that could make you fortune, why would you sell that for peanuts? Meditate simply on this for a while and try to find a reason! Knowing how a game ends, you can open a betting account by hundreds of bookmakers, bet a decent unsuspicious amount and enjoy a beautiful year full of sex, drugs and any kind of music. The other option is to put a lot of effort in spamming, advertising and hope for some greedy internet dummy biting the hook. Does it make sense?
Martingale system by sports betting
The Martingale betting system is applied from roulette, where you bet on red or black. The philosophy is to double your bet every time you lose. This actually is not complete nonsense but let’s look at the chance you will end up broke by doing it over a long term period. Let us consider the odds 2.0 and 50% chance of winning to make it simple. In the following table you see the chance of getting from a bet of 1 GBP to sick money.
| Bet number | Odds | Bet amount | Brutto win | Netto win | Loss amount total | Chance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2.0 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0,5 |
| 2 | 2.0 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 3 | 0,25 |
| 3 | 2.0 | 4 | 8 | 1 | 7 | 0,125 |
| 4 | 2.0 | 8 | 16 | 1 | 15 | 0,0625 |
| 5 | 2.0 | 16 | 32 | 1 | 31 | 0,0312 |
| 6 | 2.0 | 32 | 64 | 1 | 63 | 0,0156 |
| 7 | 2.0 | 64 | 128 | 1 | 127 | 0,0078 |
Keep in mind, the case is simplified to communicate my point easily. If the chance was 50%, the odds would be around 1,9 and that would push the bet amounts significantly higher.
The last column is actually the most important one. In the third step there is a 12,5% chance that with probability of the match result being 50% you will get up to here. This means that in more than one out of 10 bets like this one you get here. Doing this long term you will for sure come even further. Now look at step number 7. You have to bet 64 GBP to actually gain the 1 pound netto. Is it worth it? I doubt it.
This is a painful reminder for my friend betting on Detroit Red Wings back in the 2007/2008 season. They were rocking the scene and as we know the odds in NHL are due to unpredictable results relatively equal. It is really hard to say who the favourite of the game is.
He started out big with a series of 4 wins in a row. Then it started – 3 times they lost and then some draws and wins in overtime. He started to be “slightly nervous” and stopped after a round number 10 or so. It took 4 more games for the Red Wings to win in regular time. He however ended up losing thousands.
Betting experts selling tips
Most of us have noticed Facebook pages with betting experts selling tips. Now, let’s not deny there are really good punters out there with decent results. I know some of them in person. They are however too busy doing their own business, and not really willing to waste their precious time to earn peanuts. And not just that. When I directly asked them if they were willing to sell their advice about what to bet on next, all of them refused. All of them had a kind of healthy humility and admitted “You never know how the end result is going to be”. They were indeed eager to talk about what to bet next. I saw the extreme passion about sports betting and sometimes it looked like any other topic than betting was too boring to them.
What they were never willing to put up with were the emotions of the ones who don’t have a clue about sports betting. They had enough experience to know that there is no guarantee and even 10 matches in a row can go wrong. They did not want to feel responsibility for the person losing money. Once again, being a successful bettor is much less about knowing who is going to win and much more about sportsbook strategy and betting behaviour. Losing is simply part of the betting business.
On the other hand, even on our page you can follow the betting experts and copy their bets (to be implemented soon), but this is not for complete beginners. You can look at their betting statistics and details and make your own judgement. But on an anonymous Facebook page, how can you be sure you are watching and expert?
Now remember the moral of this betting myth:
There are guarantees in betting
I remember last time I lost big. It was actually not sports but politics. I was sure as one can ever be that Donald Trump will not get more votes than Hillary Clinton. And I was right. She received about 2% extra votes, but Trump still became the president and I lost. I made a huge mistake by not knowing the election system and paid hard for that. The odds were actually fantastic, and I did consider it as a clear value bet. It was only slightly strange to me, that it was so clear and so easy.
Well, it wasn’t as I learned to know the hard way. I failed in the psychology of sports betting – especially the part where you ask a correct question but answer a wrong one. The question in this case was clear “Who will be the president”. I gave an answer “Donald Trump will get more votes”. This is clearly an answer to a different question. Now I can excuse my naivety by saying “I did not know”. Well, truth. But I had to pay for that anyways. How unfair!
Besides that there are many surprises in sports betting, even on the daily basis. At the beginning the match begins with 0-0 and shit happens. There are no guarantees in sports! Each underdog can beat any team! Make sure to follow the football betting tips or value bets for tomorrow of Rowdie and combine them with critical thinking. Only then you can answer the question how to succeed in football betting.
State run betting monopoly as a guarantee
I remember the gambling Eldorado till 2012, when the operators were not controlled by any local governments. There was not a real protection for the vulnerable ones, self exclusion programs did not work at all and no real fines were given for breaking the rules. Then in many countries the local governments closed the betting market and operated the business under a state owned monopoly. As we know, with no competition, there is a tendency to predatory behaviour and it really happened. Sadly, the punters were many times ribbed off more than before.
Monopolies many times applied a fee on betting, which was up to 6% from the stake amount. So yes. If you were about to bet 100 with odds 1,10 you ended up winning only 104 since 60% of your winnings were taken by the state. Therefore were punters motivated to bet less on combo tickets. (This fee is still a practice in some East European countries when betting offline.)
The pressure to cut the state run gambling monopoly grew realy big, so the state run gambling monopolies became the past mostly all over the world. The experience so far showed it was a really good decision – most profitable for the bettors.
So what is the moral of this article? I would say it all comes down to the following sentence. Be critical! And that counts for everything – even this website. I did my best to bring you the most valuable betting content, but I have my limits too. I could have made some math mistakes, logical mistakes or I could be just a guy who is writing bullshit just to sell advert space. I am glad you read what I wrote over here, but it is your responsibility to build your own opinion or come with your own strategies. You never know, maybe hiring an Oracle might work better.
