Football (soccer) betting thread
11-27-2016
, 10:58 PM
I wonder if anyone here can help me with a question regarding football (soccer) betting. I play online poker and I have recently started playing DFS Soccer so I understand how odds and probability work. Recently I have been paying more attention to Bookmaker odds. I understand that when there are 3 outcomes:
Home Win
Draw
Away Win
Bookmakers set their odds so that they make a guaranteed profit and it seems they like to charge around 3.5 to 4% rake. That is all pretty simple when there are only 3 outcomes, such as betting on the outcome of the football match. The question is then:
How much rake are bookmakers charging on prices for Anytime Goalscorer odds?
I am interested in knowing the rough probability of a players anytime goal scoring chances in a game, which roughly correspond to his bookmaker odds minus the rake. However, there is no definite way for a bookmaker to guarantee profit here by fixing the odds of all outcomes. For a hypothetical example a game might end 4-4 with 8 different goalscorers so the Bookies are paying out a lot of people. Because of the uncertainty of markets like Anytime Goalscorer am I right to suspect that Bookmakers charge a significantly higher rake here?
My next suspicion is that the more likely it is that a player will score the more bookies will charge rake on that player because they will be paying out very often and they also want to deter everyone betting on the favourite in order to balance the books better.
Lets take Sergio Aguero as an example as he is a very frequent goalscorer. If Bookies project him to score in the next match @:
1.25 Decimal (80% implied probability)
We need Aguero to score 80% in that spot to break even. I am pretty sure that there is a lot of rake on the favourites in the Anytime Goalscorer markets and that it is way higher than the 3 or 4% they charge elsewhere. I dont think in this spot I can look at the odds and say Aguero is 80% to score today minus the bookie rake of 4% so I can expect him to score at 76%. It feels like they really hike up the rake to cover themselves when the probability is high they will have to pay out. As a contrast the odds for a centre back scoring are probably raked a lot lower as they have to pay out less often. I can see the rake here being nearer 4%. So I cant simply look at the market for Anytime Goalscorer and deduct 4% and expect the player to score at that rate as I am pretty sure individual players are raked differently.
I need to come up with a formula that deducts the rake to give me a % of the players implied probability of scoring. I am going to assume the rake is a minimum of 4% for all players. Then I have to work out if they are raking the bigger favourite goalscorers at 8% 10% 15% ?
?
If anybody here with more knowledge and experience than myself can shed any light on this please let me know as it will save me thinking about this every day.
Home Win
Draw
Away Win
Bookmakers set their odds so that they make a guaranteed profit and it seems they like to charge around 3.5 to 4% rake. That is all pretty simple when there are only 3 outcomes, such as betting on the outcome of the football match. The question is then:
How much rake are bookmakers charging on prices for Anytime Goalscorer odds?
I am interested in knowing the rough probability of a players anytime goal scoring chances in a game, which roughly correspond to his bookmaker odds minus the rake. However, there is no definite way for a bookmaker to guarantee profit here by fixing the odds of all outcomes. For a hypothetical example a game might end 4-4 with 8 different goalscorers so the Bookies are paying out a lot of people. Because of the uncertainty of markets like Anytime Goalscorer am I right to suspect that Bookmakers charge a significantly higher rake here?
My next suspicion is that the more likely it is that a player will score the more bookies will charge rake on that player because they will be paying out very often and they also want to deter everyone betting on the favourite in order to balance the books better.
Lets take Sergio Aguero as an example as he is a very frequent goalscorer. If Bookies project him to score in the next match @:
1.25 Decimal (80% implied probability)
We need Aguero to score 80% in that spot to break even. I am pretty sure that there is a lot of rake on the favourites in the Anytime Goalscorer markets and that it is way higher than the 3 or 4% they charge elsewhere. I dont think in this spot I can look at the odds and say Aguero is 80% to score today minus the bookie rake of 4% so I can expect him to score at 76%. It feels like they really hike up the rake to cover themselves when the probability is high they will have to pay out. As a contrast the odds for a centre back scoring are probably raked a lot lower as they have to pay out less often. I can see the rake here being nearer 4%. So I cant simply look at the market for Anytime Goalscorer and deduct 4% and expect the player to score at that rate as I am pretty sure individual players are raked differently.
I need to come up with a formula that deducts the rake to give me a % of the players implied probability of scoring. I am going to assume the rake is a minimum of 4% for all players. Then I have to work out if they are raking the bigger favourite goalscorers at 8% 10% 15% ?
? If anybody here with more knowledge and experience than myself can shed any light on this please let me know as it will save me thinking about this every day.
12-08-2016
, 11:54 AM
12-22-2016
, 08:48 PM
03-14-2017
, 11:28 AM
04-19-2017
, 08:35 AM
Quote:
Hi, I'll try to answer your question.
As you said it is fairly easy to calculate the rake on 2 and 3 outcomes.
Payout rate = 1 / (1/home team odds + 1 /away team odds).
However one does not know how the bookies distribute their margins across the 2 different outcomes. Research on this area seems to suggest that there is something called the favorite longshot bias at play, meaning that bookies gives out too low odds on the dogs and too high odds on the favorites. Because they know that people tend to overestimate the probability of an underdog winning. Pinnacle has a lot of good educational articles for bettors, and also one covering the fav-longshot that I advocate reading. https://www.pinnacle.com/en/betting-...-longshot-bias
This makes sense from a business perspective, because if you know you are going to sell a high volume of Coca Cola, you can get away with a lower margin. However if you are also selling a really expensive Whiskey at $1000 a bottle, you want to have a high margin, since they sell more rarely. This is how you balance your books.
There is no easy way of figuring out the margin on the goal scorer odds. But what I would say is that you can guarantee that it is higher than the moneyline, totals and more popular odds types where the bookies get a higher volume of trades. Also, their margins on defenders scoring is likely to be a lot higher than for Aguero, so basically the opposite of what you are suggesting.
As you said it is fairly easy to calculate the rake on 2 and 3 outcomes.
Payout rate = 1 / (1/home team odds + 1 /away team odds).
However one does not know how the bookies distribute their margins across the 2 different outcomes. Research on this area seems to suggest that there is something called the favorite longshot bias at play, meaning that bookies gives out too low odds on the dogs and too high odds on the favorites. Because they know that people tend to overestimate the probability of an underdog winning. Pinnacle has a lot of good educational articles for bettors, and also one covering the fav-longshot that I advocate reading. https://www.pinnacle.com/en/betting-...-longshot-bias
This makes sense from a business perspective, because if you know you are going to sell a high volume of Coca Cola, you can get away with a lower margin. However if you are also selling a really expensive Whiskey at $1000 a bottle, you want to have a high margin, since they sell more rarely. This is how you balance your books.
There is no easy way of figuring out the margin on the goal scorer odds. But what I would say is that you can guarantee that it is higher than the moneyline, totals and more popular odds types where the bookies get a higher volume of trades. Also, their margins on defenders scoring is likely to be a lot higher than for Aguero, so basically the opposite of what you are suggesting.
Yeah looks as if I got it backwards. I think my thought process went something like this. I guesstimated that on an anytime goalscorer favourite like Aguero that the rake would be about 4%.
Then I looked at Centre Backs who are the longshot to score. A lot of the time their odds were only like 3%. So I mistakenly thought that the bookmaker was charging less rake on the long shots because the rake would have to be under 3% if the Centre Back is only 3% to score.
After reading the article that seems incorrect. It would appear bookies can charge a much lower rake on the favourite and still turn a healthy profit. Plus these markets will be much more competitive because of rival bookmakers and odds comparison sites. It would be more likely that there is 1% rake on Aguero and 2% rake on the Centre Back who is 3% to score.
Thanks for that, I will adjust my spreadsheet accordingly