Leveraging Form And Statistics For Smarter Betting Decisions

• August 30,2024
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• Jake Woodward

Leveraging Form And Statistics For Smarter Betting Decisions

People place sports bets for various reasons, each with their unique motivation. Some place bets for fun, and others for the excitement and adrenaline accompanying this exciting hobby. However, there are a few others for whom betting is a very serious business. These bettors can be described as professionals, and they aim to craft a well-paying career out of sports betting. For this category of gamblers, there’s no placing bets just for the sake of placing a bet. These people have a well-defined budget for betting, and they’ll do everything within their power to ensure they can accrue a certain amount in returns per betting period. For such people, analyzing forms and statistics is of the utmost importance. For professional punters like these, betting is truly an art.

Beating The Bookie With Value Bets

A popular phrase in sports betting circles is “beating the bookie.” Beating one’s bookie means having an edge over the bookmaker and using this edge to place a successful bet. If you, as a punter, can see things that the bookmaker can’t see and are thus able to make a better prediction, then you certainly have the upper hand. Betting revolves around betting odds, otherwise known as betting prices. These are figures posted by the bookmaker to inform the punter how much money they stand to make if they are able to predict an outcome from any sporting event successfully. These betting prices are also a window into the mind of the bookmaker, revealing their expectations about the sporting event. If the betting price is low, the bookmaker expects that outcome to happen easily. If the betting price is high, on the other hand, the bookie thinks the chances of that outcome happening are very slim. Successful predictions of unlikely outcomes result in a tough situation for the punter because they have to pay a lot to the punter. This is a dream situation for the punter because it means they have found VALUE in their bet. Value betting is where a punter, by professing more knowledge about a sporting event, can make a better prediction, one closer to the true probability of an outcome, than what the bookmaker predicts.

Form And Statistics To Increase Value In Betting

The question, then, is: How can a punter get closer to the true probability of an outcome than their punter? This is precisely where analyzing form and statistics is advantageous for any punter. In the perpetual war between the sportsbook and the sports punter, whoever can better analyze form and statistics has the upper hand. The form describes how well a team or athlete performs in recent matches. Good form implies that the team or athlete has been doing great over the past few matches and can thus be expected to continue in the same vein in the match the punter wishes to bet on. Statistics may be used to gauge form because it involves looking at such things as:

• Team’s or player’s results in the last X matches, e.g., last 10 matches.

• Team’s or player’s performance in away matches vs. in-home matches.

• Team’s or player’s performance in certain weather.

• Team’s performance with or without player X.

• Head to Head (H2H) results between competing teams or players.

Analyzing form and statistics is an excellent way to gain value in betting because it results in quality predictions that are likely to lead to successful bets. Any punter interested in a profitable sports betting experience should invest time in researching forms and statistics.