The easiest way to predict a football match is to have a favourite team, cheer them on, and hope for the best. The prediction? Of course, the win of your favorite team. Is it professional? No. Is it effective? For the most part, also no. We live in an age when the game has improved a lot. Football is no longer a 4-4-2 formation, pacy wingers, tall strikers, and long balls. We’re past that. Data is the king. Team data, roster data, team form, players qualities that go past speed and strength. With teamwork in the midst of it, if you’re serious about predicting results of your favorite team, and much more, you ought to learn how to use team and squad data to make smarter predictions.
Statistics and probabilities will take you far beyond simple win and loss records will. There are numerous metrics that go into squad data and form such as expected goals, shots on target, and scoring trends, all of which can make you a better bettor. If you plan on winning plenty during the World Cup and in the autumn where the majority of top flights of European football kick off, you need to read this article. It will help you a lot the next time when you get ready to bet on football online. Let’s start.
The Importance of Statistics
If you want to remove emotions from football, the place to start are the statistics. It is often that even smart bettors succumb to their emotions, make poor wagering decisions, and lose money while betting due to the presence of emotions. Also, listening to public opinions instead of focusing on raw stats will lead you away from wins. Actual match data is where your focus needs to be. By using stats you can start recognizing better betting opportunities where they weren’t visible to you before, recognizing which teams are more consistent than others, noticing patterns both on defence and offense, to avoid emotional betting, and improve your decision making in the long term.
Stats You Ought to Put Into Focus
A single football match affects an entire league. There’s plenty of stats that get accumulated during a week of football, so you need to learn which stats you need to pay the most attention to. Not all stats are the same. Some matter more. Here are the ones you need to keep in your focus to improve your betting outcomes in following weeks.
Team Form
Football is a team game. Yes, some matches can be resolved by individual brilliance but on most occasions it’s the team that takes home the win. If you’re serious about analysing teams for your net betting slip, team form is the place where to start. Team form plays a great role in the probability of the outcome of following matches for each team. While team reputation does play a role, focusing more on the results of their past ten matches matters more. What you should put in your focus include but is not limited to losing and winning streaks, form, both home and away, goal scored and goals conceded, stability of the defence, and match consistency of the attack. When you look at stats, it is important to divide them into home and away stats, as some teams dominate on home turn while often play below their means away.
Goal Difference:Goals Scored vs. Goals Conceded
Through goal difference you can see which teams are weak defensively and which are powerful in attack. When you focus on the over/under sports betting markets you need to pay a lot of attention to goal difference. Teams that score a lot but are also porous in defence are ideal to play over. Teams that play to win 1:0 such as Juventus teams from the start of 2000s are ideal to play under each game. So, when you have a set of games in front of you and you’re looking to make over 1.5 goals prediction, or whether to play under 2.5 goals predictions, goal difference is where you look first. Of course, before you start focusing on goal difference, we assume that you are already well adept in reading through over/under markets. So, if you do, when you have teams that average over 2.0 goals per match, they’re almost a safe bet for over 1.5 goals. At the same time, teams that barely average over 0.5 goals per match are your bet to go for under wagers.
Expected Goals (xG)
Many old school bettors stay away from the expected goals section. Yet, modern analytics show that there’s magic to xG. Expected goals show the bettors the quality of chances created during a team’s match. It expands the goals scored stats which are quite simple stats in comparison. With xG your focus shifts toward a probability that a quality chance turns into a goal, based on previous performance of a team and their overall form. What’s tricky with xG is that a team can create chances but not convert them, so having an xG of 2.9 over time doesn’t mean that a team will score 3 goals each match. Yet, what it does signifies is that throughout the season if the number of quality chances steadily grows so will the converted chances which will result in more goals too. By looking at xG you can easily pinpoint teams that are underperforming, teams that have firepower in attack, high scoring matches in advance, and false scoreline results. xG is used by all professional analysts that use it to analyse performance patterns, meaning that it is the right moment for you our dear bettors to take them into account.
Shots on Target
The essence of the game. Teams can’t score goals if they don’t shoot on target and past the keeper. Yet, shots on target are not a straightforward stat. There’s more to it. They also take into account attacking pressure and chance creation ratio. When you have a team that’s good in producing high shots on target, those teams will by default score more goals too. At the end of the day, goals come from scoring opportunities. Have those in numbers and the goals will follow. You can use shots on target, a combination of both teams that are playing against each other to better estimate the odds of a game being played with over 2.5 goals, overall goal range prediction, or to have both teams to score. Scoring probability is always increased when you have teams with plenty of shots on target playing teams criticized for poor defending.
Both Teams to Score Trends
The odds of both teams scoring are always fairly good. They range from 1.5 and upward with most bookmakers. It is an ideal betting market when two teams with poor defensive records face each other. If this is the market you want to conquer it is best to look into teams that have scored in majority of their most recent matches, teams who cannot keep a clean sheet to save their lives, teams that play with open and attacking playstyle, and when both teams are fairly balanced on both defence and offense. While defense plays a vital role in every match, if you plan to wager on BTTS, you need to put more focus on the attacking side of the ball.
Step by Step Analysis
Sports betting is not a game. It is a fun pastime but with money involved you’re better off getting good at it sooner than later. If you’re serious about it, you will make stats, analytics, and all kinds of team data part of your curriculum before every wager, and especially if you play parlays. When you’re ready to dedicate your time to stats, start by checking the team’s recent form. Five to ten past matches is the bare minimum you need to look into. See if a team scores/concedes on a regular basis, are they in from an wining, do they play better at home or away, and their overall form too.
Next, you need to do a bit of a comparison. Check how the teams you want to wager on, play both away and at home. Most teams play differently depending on the venue, and adapt tactics when travelling from home compared to how they approach the game plan when played in front of the home crowd. It is not rare to see teams that dominate at home, but struggle when playing away. Many teams, especially those with passionate fans play with grit at home, score at will, and then turn to defensive juggernauts when playing away from home. No one who ignores how teams play depending on the venue where they play do not put enough effort into their slips.
Furthermore, you definitely need to step into the domain of goal trends analysis. By knowing a thing or two about goal trends you will be able to better identify best betting markets for what you want to put on your slip. If you’re going safe, you will bet on over 1.5 goals. Yet, better paying odds come with playing over 2.5 goals. Of course, for teams that do not score all that much, aiming to have them go under 2.5 goals is also on the table.
Lastly, but also very important, you need to have an input into the teams that play and their rosters. Injuries and suspensions play a vital role in how a certain match will develop. Missing a key figure in defence is often hard to compensate, especially for teams that do not have depth. Having them conceding more than their average suggests then becomes a real possibility. Also, depending on the part of the season when a duel is played, you need to take into account the team’s motivation. Often, matches are played under a shadow of a title race, relegation battle, different types of qualifiers, and so on. Motivation will play a big role in how a team performs.
Popular Types of Football Bets
Now that you know how stats and team form can aid you in making the best out of your wagers, you could get acquainted or just reminded of the popular types of football bets. The classic one is the 1×2. It is a simple wager where you bet on the outcome of a single match whether it’s a home win, a draw, or an away win. Secondly, you have a Draw no Bet wager, which is a moneyline wager where you guess the winner. In the case of a draw, you will get your money back. Double chances is betting on two outcomes in a single match. You can play as 1x, x2, or 12. Where you give yourself a better chance of hitting on that wager, but with lowered odds.
Asian total is where things get even more interesting. This is where knowing the team’s stats will really come into play. It is a wager on the exact number of goals scored in a duel. You can also exploit the over/under market. There is also Asian handicap, where a certain goal advantage or the so called handicap applied to one of the teams, and you make your wager based on the given handicap at increased or decreased odds, depending on the handicap.
When it comes to betting on numbers you can go with BTTS, correct score, halftime/fulltime results, number of corners and over/under on corners, yellow cards, red cards, fouls, and anything in between when it comes to football. When you get adept at the basics feel free to exploit betting markets such as prop bets, parlay bets, same game multis, outrights, minute markets, and 1UP & 2UP bets.
Sports betting is fun no matter how you look at it. Yet, it cannot be fun for too long if you keep on losing money. It is all about winning. So, bet responsibly, learn your sports betting markets, and of course, apply your knowledge of stats and analysis.
