How to Bet on Soccer Games
How to Bet on Soccer Matches
Betting on soccer is a bit different than many other sports, so let’s make sure you understand the basics before getting ready to score at Fanatics Sportsbook.
Soccer Moneyline Betting
Typically when you think of moneyline, you think of betting on Team A or Team B to win. With soccer, a third moneyline option is thrown into the mix—draw.
Because draw has moneyline odds listed, even if the team you bet on doesn’t lose and draws, it’s graded as a betting loss rather than a push. Since there are more options for how a match can be decided compared to a two-way market, however, bettors will get better prices when there’s three options versus if there were only two.
The other thing to keep in mind is if the match is in a knockout or elimination game of a major tournament. The three-way moneyline market (Team A, Team B or draw) only applies to the first 90 minutes of the match plus stoppage time.
So if Team B advances on penalty kicks or scores the game-winning goal in extra time, draw would be the winning soccer moneyline bet since the game was tied after 90 minutes plus stoppage time.
If Team B had scored the game-winning goal two minutes into stoppage time, Team B would be the winning moneyline bet since stoppage time scoring counts for this markets.
Soccer Total Betting
If you want to focus on how many goals are scored in a game, betting totals is for you. You can either wager on the over or under of a game’s total, which is why this market is also often referred to as the over/under.
Let’s say you bet the over on a total of 2, and Team A beats Team B 2-1. Since the match finished with 3 goals, your over bet has cashed. On the flip side, if you bet under 2 and it ends as a 0-0 draw (or 0 combined goals), your under bet has cashed. Now if the score ended up being 1-1, that means 2 pushed and you would get your original stake back.
Soccer Player Prop Betting
If you’d rather zero in on a specific player to have a big performance over either team, there are player prop markets available for bigger soccer matches. You can wager on whether a player will score a goal, as well as even score two goals or a hat trick in a match. Shots on target for specific players are also available to bet on, which is part of how to bet soccer online effectively.
Soccer Team/Game Prop Betting
One popular soccer market is “Both Teams to Score” or BTTS. It’s just like it sounds, you either bet on “YES” or NO” for both teams to score. If you take YES, you need both teams to score in the first 90 minutes plus stoppage time. If you choose NO, either one or zero teams can score in the first 90 minutes plus stoppage time to cash your bet.
Other props available include total corners (where you can bet over or under a team’s number of corners in a match) and correct score (where you bet on what the final score of a match will be after 90 minutes plus stoppage time).
Soccer Futures Betting
A soccer futures bet is when you bet on something that takes place in the future or will be determined later in the season compared to the current slate. For popular leagues like the Premier League, La Liga or Major League Soccer, you can wager on futures markets such as winner and top goal scorer.
For major tournaments such as the World Cup, Euros or Copa America, there are futures available like tournament winner, group winner, top goal scorer and much more.