Most of the people who bet on cricket are fans of the game and have the skill to make correct value odds predictions. Every cricket fan has their favorite team, and they follow all the careers and the performances of the individual players in the matches. People love the thrill that comes from putting money on stake and making a profit out of it. However, the punters who are serious about making a profit should develop a specific cricket betting strategy. Cricket is one of the difficult sports to bet on since it has a wide range of markets including ante-post bets and in-play live betting. One of the major dangers in cricket value betting is not having a strategy. Instead of speculative bets, a cricket value strategy helps you in winning good money.
What is Cricket Value Betting?
Cricket Value Betting is placing a bet with the betting odds that do not reflect the true possibility of the outcomes but puts the different values to the odds. To understand value betting at its core, use the coin toss situation. If a coin is flipped, it can land on either the heads side or tails side. Each side of the bet has a 50% probability of winning, no matter how much you bet. However, you would never be able to make money in the long term if you are betting on the odds of 50/50 or 2.00.
To make a profit, bookmakers offer a 1.90 on each outcome by taking a margin of 4.8% in each case – applying it to odds on the market. Now, imagine if the bookmaker has offered 1.90 on the heads and the 2.10 on the tails. What would you do? If the odds are more on tails, always back tails. The higher the odds, the better the money you gain from it. You might not win the bet each time, but you will make more money in the longer term. The key to successful betting is finding the value bets and prices that are offered by the bookmakers as you estimate the chances of bets.
How to apply value betting to cricket?
The bookmaker odds are the best form of opinion or prediction on the possible outcome. No one can accurately predict the win or the outcome of a cricket match because of the multiple variables in it. The opinions are often backed by historical data, statistics, player records, and years of experience. Even after significant research, these opinions can still go wrong. The bookie cricket odds are mostly influenced by what people are betting on or what they would bet on. The relation between people’s bets and bookie betting odds are thus correlative. Since the cricket odds often originate from the bookmaker’s assessment of event probability, know that they don’t reflect the true possibility. Applying cricket value betting involves calculating the probability of events and placing the bets accurately than most of the bookmakers to have an edge of profit.
How do we know if cricket odds represent value?
Let’s take an example to know if cricket odds represent value. A bookmaker is offering a bet on the IPL match played between Chennai Super Kings and Mumbai Indians at a neutral venue where both of them are doing good. The odds of each team are:
- Chennai Super Kings – 2.5
- Mumbai Indians – 1.5
Can we now apply the bets based on the value betting strategy? No. You need to use your analyzing ability and judgment to make a bet. Consider all the historical events between both the teams and see who won. Research the news, the sides, the players and the venue to create your probabilities of each team winning. For example, if you calculate Mumbai Indians to have a winning chance of 40%, then Chennai Super Kings will have a 60% winning chance. The percentage should always total up to 100%. Hence, if you back Chennai Super Kings and they win, you get the value bet in your favour.
Now, how can you convert the given cricket odds to the actual probability percentage?
This isn’t rocket science. You just have to know the right odds of each team winning to convert them into percentages. The formula for the conversion of odds is:
Chennai Super Kings =1/ 2.5 x 100 =40%
Mumbai Indians = 1 /1.5 x 100 =66.66%
Total = 106.6%
As you can see, the Cricket Betting Rates is more than 100%. The additional 6.66% is the bookmaker’s profit. If the bookmaker is making bets of worth INR 1066, on both Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings; they will have to pay INR 1000 regardless of who is winning, and they will have INR 66 as profit. This is how bookmakers make money.
How to know when to take value odds?
Detecting value odds is critical to winning more in the long run. For example, if you look at the above match, the bookmaker’s probabilities are totally different from the percentage probabilities. Here you can have a valuable opportunity by betting on Chennai Super Kings at 2.5 match odds. Calculate the estimations to know that there’s a 50% chance of Chennai Super Kings winning the match through previous records. The bookmaker odds margin reflects a 40% chance of Chennai Super Kings’ victory. In such cases, if we bet INR 10,000 on the CSK as the winner, the expected value of the bet will be:
The Expected value of the bet given its single = 10000*2.5 – 10000 = 15000 INR
And the true chance of winning the bet is 50%.
Therefore, (15000*50) – (10000*50) = INR 2500
In simple words, we can make a profit of INR 2500 on an average bet by betting it again and again for longer duration profits.
However, there are certain things that a bettor should be wary about when they are engaged in value betting.
You will always have a favorite in the match whom you think will win. Bookmakers of Cricket Match Odds Site usually make cash out of the favorites. They know the team that people will bet on. Therefore, they will make lower odds on your favorite team than present the true odds to avoid the liabilities on the favorite. In the above example, Chennai Super Kings is the favorite of many punters. The truth is that most of the bettors will bet on them, regardless of the given odds. The best value opportunities in such cases is having bigger prices on the outsiders. In such cases, it would be foolish to not consider the implied betting and the bookmaker match odds even when you think that your favorite team will definitely win. Your bets shall always be based on your assessment of the betting odds and proper analysis of team performance.
Conclusion
In conclusion, the hardest thing for a new bettor while using the value betting strategy is to develop that mindset. You need to have the mathematical skill set and the ability to detect value in the presented odds. It is crucial to not get emotional as it might result in irrational thinking. One should target the secondary odd markets by browsing through various Cricket match odds sites and markets instead of high volume markets like the probable match winners for better profits.
