How to Start Sports Betting: A Simple Guide

Whatever sport you follow or are just starting to have an interest in, you are going to come across a dull game occasionally. Even the most fast-paced and action-packed sports, like Formula 1 and the English Premier League, can provide some dire viewing sometimes.

For centuries, fans of sports have increased the action, and their interest, by placing wagers on events to make things a little more fun. These days this is even easier, with a huge range of online and brick and mortar bookmakers offering online services and apps that let you place wagers on just about any game or sport.

Sports betting can be a fun hobby that can even give you some profit on occasion, and it makes dull games good, and good games great. It only takes small stakes to give a matchday something more. Here is our simple guide to starting sports betting, so you can start having a little extra fun too. Remember to gamble responsibly, and when the fun stops, you should stop.

Start Simple, Build Your Knowledge with Your Pot

Don't rush into sports betting, start with small stakes, and experiment a little. Give yourself a pot to play with, let's say £20, and use that amount to draw your small stakes from.
This £20 pot could give you forty 50p bets, or twenty £1 bets, or a mix of the two. Keep your stakes small, and return your winnings to your pot. If you bet smart, and you are careful, this pot will begin to grow and allow you to place higher stake bets later on.

Speculate to Accumulate

Accumulators, or Acca's, are one of the most popular kinds of bets that people make on European football games.

Accumulators are a large bet that is comprised of other bets called 'legs'. These legs will be on results or events in games, Manchester United to draw, and Norwich to score 2 or more goals, for example, and the odds of each leg will be multiplied with one another. Huge odds can be created by creating accumulators of 6 or more legs.

The legs can be chosen from games from multiple leagues across Europe, and small stakes of just a few pennies can yield huge returns from these types of bets. If one leg fails, however, then the whole bet fails with it. This is why the odds can be so high.

Hedging Your Bets

This is a phrase that people use a lot, in all kinds of circumstances. In betting, a hedge bet is one that acts as 'cover' to an existing bet.

A simple example of this would be in an English football F.A. Cup game. If a lower league side, Accrington Stanley, for instance, was drawn to play a Premier League side like Chelsea, then the odds of Accrington winning or scoring will be quite high. Most people will bet on Chelsea to win, and the odds of Chelsea 'Win-to-nil', or winning without Accrington scoring, will be attractive odds.
If you place a bet of 'Chelsea win-to-nil', you could hedge that bet by placing a small stake on 'Accrington to score', which should be at higher odds. Then if Accrington Stanley spoils your bet on Chelsea by scoring a goal, your hedge bet should cover your loss and maybe even provide you a small profit overall.

The More You Know the Faster Your Pot Will Grow

The best advice that we can give about placing sports bets is to do your research. In this instance, knowledge is truly a powerful force, and a little extra research and patience can go a long way.
This isn't just about knowing teams, their form, and their histories, but also knowing bookmakers and how they will react in certain circumstances. If the odds on a football team to win or score are low before a game, they will increase during a game as an in-play bet. Knowing this can help you get better odds from bets you identify. By switching a pre-match bet to an in-play bet, you can often get a higher return from the bet in the first 10 minutes of play. Be careful a goal doesn't come early though. This could ruin a bet. However, a small stake hedge bet on a goal in the first 15 minutes could offer you come cover!

You can find out more about how to bet on sports and sports betting with Roger.com. They have a lot of information about online bookmakers and the types of bets you can place on sports. They even have strategies and guides to playing casino games like poker and slot machines.

Sports betting can be a lot of fun, and provide a welcome profit when you win your bets.

emember to bet responsibly, and never place more stakes than you are willing to lose. With the right, disciplined, approach, you can have a little fun all year long across several sports without having to spend a lot of money.