Football is, without a doubt, one of the most dynamic sports ever. A staggering number of people worldwide enjoy viewing it and it is a favourite sport to wager on for sports bettors. The sport is known as one of the fastest-paced games, with surprising turns within every match and championship.

Football is one of the best sports for sport betting enthusiasts due to the multivarious betting types available to choose from. One of these bet types is arbitrage betting, which is one of the most talked-about manners in football betting as it allows bettors to boost their winning chances significantly.

What is Arbitrage in Football Betting?

You might have heard the term arbitrage already, especially in the field of economics and finances, which describes the purchase and sale of a product. It aims to look at the disbalance of the price within the service or commodity.

Arbitrage betting has been in the sports betting industry for a long time. Even though this betting technique is a favourite among an impressive number of football betting enthusiasts, many bookmakers don’t allow it and forbid their players to take advantage of it. The recent technological improvements in the online betting scene have changed the way this strategy works.

Football bettors who have never used this betting strategy need to know that thanks to arbitrage betting, bettors can enjoy the variety of odds values offered by the different online betting sites. Arbitrage betting requires bettors to track down sports betting sites that give you the chance to make stakes on a sporting event. You need to find out if the value of the odds dramatically differs from one bookie to another. Keep in mind that arbitrage betting can only work for a certain period of time because of the reliance on the odd's fluctuation. Therefore, be prepared for a drastic change in the value of the odds and you must know how to take advantage of it instantly. To get the chance to make more profits in arbitrage betting, you'll need a lot of patience and a larger number of stakes.

Calculating Football Arbitrage Bets

Arbitrage in sports betting is a way of putting your bets on every outcome of events with odds that guarantees a win, whatever the match results turn out to be. The regular markets are usually priced at 100% based on the chances for an event to occur – for arbitrage, an arber bets on every eventuality across multiple betting providers. This lets them take advantage of the difference in price and decreases the odd’s value below 100%, which increases your winning chances.

We have listed 2 ways to boost your winning chances in arbitrage. The first is by using an arbitrage calculator. The second is by arbitrage betting between two betting sites. And third is by arbing between a bookie and an exchange. The second and third method lets you lower the value below 100%, but the difference is that the third option lets you buy or back the outcome. Read more about how to calculate arbitrage betting here.

Football Arbitrage Betting between Two Bookmakers

Let's say that a matchup between Arsenal and Barcelona is up, and you have checked two bookmakers that offer odds on this event. Assume that the first bookie you've signed up for an account provides the odds of 1.30 for Arsenal to win while Barcelona has 3.70 odds to win the match. Bookie number two offers the odds of 1.50 for Arsenal to win and 3.00 for Barcelona.

With all the odds set, you must first place a stake on Barcelona on the first online sportsbook and make another stake on Arsenal on the second one. In other words, it's best to crossmatch the prices you are offered at the specific sporting event. An important thing to remember is that you need to make sure that the wagers you will make suit the value of proportions of the odds during your time of using arbitrage betting. A crucial thing bettors must do is estimate the probability that is implied. This is done by simply dividing 1 by the odds value, then multiplying the result by 100. Let's use the above stats as an example to obtain the implied probability of Barcelona's odds. You'll need to divide one by 3.70. This means that it stands at 27.02%. However, for Arsenal, we will receive the implied probability of 71.4%. The next step is to put together all your values and figure out if you have succeeded in spotting an arbitrage betting market and if it is worth making a stake.

Note that as long as the value you have in total doesn't exceed 100%, the options are worth the risk. In this case, the stake from the previous example is beneficial as the implied probability is a total of 98.4%.

Let's say you want to bet $100 on the wager. To calculate your arbitrage's bet size in every bookmaker, you need to multiply the overall stake by the implied chances of every bookmaker. After that, you'll need to divide the value you own by the combined value with the market margin. So, the formula will look something like this:

(amount intended for football betting x the implied probability of the bookie)/total market margin.

 Therefore, from the previous example, if you stake on Barcelona, you need to bet as much as $27.4. for Arsenal, you will need to wager up to $72.5.

Football Arbitrage Betting between An Exchange and A Bookmaker

Another alternative way of football arbitrage betting Is the bets bet between an exchange and a bookmaker. This also lets football fans bet on a specific match. However, the biggest difference is that they can buy or back the outcome or directly the opposite, which is selling or laying it to enhance profits and minimize their losses.

Let's take a matchup between Real Madrid and Chelsea as an example, where the odds of Real Madrid becoming the winner are 2.20 while the odds of Chelsea are 2.00.  Like the previous example, we need first to calculate the implied probability where in the first case is 45.4% while the second is at 52.6%. When we put the values together, the total margin adds up to 98%.

For the odds of Real Madrid, let's assume that the lay price of the team victory is 2.20. in the exchange, the bet that Real Madrid will lose is 1.85. The market margin here is at 99.2%, which means it's the perfect time for an arbitrage bet. The formula will look like this:

(lay price x back wager) / (value of the current lay odds -exchange commission)

Therefore, as long as you've staked up to $100 with the commission of 0.02, the lay stake would be $118.2.

Arbing vs Matched Betting - Which One is Better?

The arbitrage and matched betting strategies are both based on similar possibilities where bookies provide opportunities that bettors can exploit and make guaranteed winnings. Even though these are excellent strategies that bettors use to maximize their profits, they share their downsides.

Matched betting is an easy strategy to learn and doesn’t require you to monitor all the stats. It’s also a great strategy to make money in a short time. On the other hand, arbitrage betting may take longer for you to make money, but the rewards can be significantly bigger compared to what you can get in arbitrage betting.

Both matched betting and arbitrage have their advantages and disadvantages as it depends on your bankroll, skill level and goals.

Final Thoughts

In the end, arbitrage betting is a betting strategy you should consider for long-term profits. The bottom line is to make sure you don't have unrealistic expectations and that the opportunities don't come by too often. Read our tips on how to find arbitrage opportunities and help you to increase more profits. Arbitrage betting is not ideal if you want to utilize it for a single football match. Instead, look for the long-term picture, which will deliver bigger profits into your pockets.