We feel the best way to explain how football spread betting works is to give you a real-life example.
We’ll use one of our most popular football spread betting markets, which is ‘Total Goals’ (the total number of goals scored in the match in 90 minutes). For those of you reading this who are more familiar with conventional fixed-odds betting, you’ll know the most common ‘Total Goals’ market is over/under 2.5 goals. From here, you can either choose to back the different markets depending on whether or not you think there will be more than 2.5 goals (3 goals or more) or less than 2.5 goals (2 goals or less). Depending on what you stake, you will receive a fixed reward if your bet comes in.
The difference with spread betting is that if you opt to buy ‘Total Goals’ with a spread bet, you would win more money for every goal over the BUY price. With spread betting, if you BUY over 2.5 you would be rewarded for every additional goal. Whereas with a fixed-odds bet, you could bet on over 2.5 goals and no matter how many goals are scored over 2.5, you will win your fixed amount.
Below are some of the most popular football spread betting markets, but for now, we’ll focus on the ‘Total Goals’ market.
Basic Football Spread Betting Example
As you can see, SportsSpread is quoting that there will either be an average of 1.95 goals in the game, which is why there is a SELL price of 1.85 and a BUY price of 2.05.
If you believe there will be 3 or more goals in this game, you would BUY, if you believe there will be fewer than 2 goals you would simply SELL the spread. The more correct you are, the more money you stand to win from your bet, however, you could lose more money depending on how wrong you are.
Real-Life Football Spread Betting Example
Let’s make this a more realistic example by adding the financial side of the stake into the equation. In this scenario, you decide to place a £10 stake per point on the BUY price at 2.05. The end result of the game is 3-0; this means that the Total Goals market is going to settle at 3. This is where spread betting differs from fixed-odds betting. Yes, you have got your bet right, however, your winnings are going to be calculated by the difference between the settled price and the price you bought at, multiplied by your stake. This would work as the following:
(Settled Price - BUY Price) x Stake
(3 - 2.05) x £10
0.95 x £10 = £9.50 Profit
You can see this bet has been rewarded £9.50 profit for the extra goal. But it gets even better! If there were 4 goals in the game, the following outcome of the bet would be as follows:
(Settled Price - BUY Price) x Stake
(4 - 2.05) x £10
1.95 x £10 = £19.50 Profit
So, from the extra goal, you would earn an extra £10. This would then be repeated for every additional goal over the agreed ‘buy’ amount.
Now, as we’re all well aware, not all bets are winners. Below is what your bet would look like if it was to lose because only 1 goal was scored.
(Settled Price - BUY Price) x Stake
(1 - 2.05) x £10
-1.05 x £10 = £10.50 Loss
The Difference Between Football Spread Betting & Fixed-Odds Betting
Betting on the fixed-odds market means you are presented with a fixed quote for what your prediction is worth, should it win.
Let’s say you believe that England will beat Senegal 3-0 in the World Cup. A fixed-odds bookmaker may give you 5/1 odds on that outcome. You place a £10 stake and because the bet is successful, you win yourself £60.
Now with spread betting, you’re rewarded on how correct the prediction is when it comes in. Let’s use the same example but for spread betting markets:
SportsSpread is predicting the total number of goals in the game between England and Senegal will be 0.9 - 1.1. England has been scoring for fun recently so you BUY the stake at £10. England goes on to win 3-0. Your return will work out as follows:
(End Result - BUY Price) x Stake
(3 - 1.1) x £10
1.9 x £10 = £19 Profit
Essentially, for every goal above or below the spread, you will win your stake back, or lose it, depending on if you’re correct.
Most Popular Football Spread Betting Markets Explained
SportsSpread has lots of football markets for you to choose from. To explain the differences, we’ve provided examples and information for the most popular football spread betting markets below.
Bookings
With Booking markets, you can bet on the number of yellow and red cards that there’ll be in a match. For every yellow card shown 10 points are awarded, and for every red card you are awarded 25 points. One player can receive a maximum of 35 points in a single game (yellow then red card).
Let’s use Liverpool and Chelsea as an example:
SportsSpread is offering a booking point spread of 46 - 50 in the Liverpool vs Chelsea game. You’re certain there are going to be bookings because of the rivalry between the two.
The full-time whistle blows and the game finishes with a total of four yellow cards and one red card. That's a point total of 65. Your bet would look like this (if you BUY the spread at £10):
(Settled Points - Spread) x Stake
(65 - 50) x £10
15 x £10 = £150 Profit
Now, for those who SELL with a stake of £2 at 46, the result would be as follows:
(Spread - Settled Points) x Stake
(46 - 65) x £2
-19 x £2 = £38 Loss
SportsSpread also offers football spread betting markets for ‘Team Bookings Points’, ‘Time of First Red Card’, and ‘Booking Supremacy’.
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Corners
In the Liverpool vs Chelsea game, you see that SportsSpread.com has set a ‘Total Corners’ market spread of 9.5 - 10.5. Let’s say, for this example, you decide to SELL the spread at £10. At full-time there are only 6 corners taken, so your bet would look like this.
(Spread - Settled Points) x Stake
(9.5 - 6) x £10
3.5 x £10 = £35 Profit
For people choosing to BUY the spread (10.5) at £10, their bet would look like this:
(Settled Points - Spread) x Stake
(6 - 10.5) x £10
-4.5 x £10 = £45 Loss
SportsSpread also offers corner markets for the ‘Time of the First Corner’, ‘Total Number of Corners’, ‘Corner Supremacy’ and ‘Corners Squared’.
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Shirt Numbers
The ‘Shirt Numbers’ market refers to the combined number of shirt numbers from all of the goalscorers in the game.
Let's say the game finishes 1-1 and one of the players is wearing the number 26 shirt and another in the number 9 shirt, the market would settle at 35 points.
For this example, we’ll say Liverpool is playing Brighton and SportsSpread is offering Shirt Numbers at 38-41. Liverpool wins 3-0 and the goalscorers' shirt numbers are 66, 9 and 11 (86).
If you choose to BUY the spread with a £10 your bet would look like this:
(Settled Points - Spread) x Stake
(86 - 41) x £10
45 x £10 = £450 Profit
View Football Markets
