Glorious Goals

Copyright J Mainwaring 2015

May not be copied, distributed or re-sold without express permission of

J Mainwaring

DISCLAIMER: Gambling, by its nature involves risk. Never gamble or speculate with money
you can’t afford to lose. The method described in this guide is offered for entertainment
purposes, and the author cannot be held responsible for any losses. Actual results may vary.
Introduction
If you’ve read any of my guides, articles or blog posts before you’ll know that I
have my uncle to thank for my interest in betting. I didn’t really get involved
until I discovered Betfair in around 2001, but I certainly loved the idea of
winning money from a young age! Sadly of course, my uncle, like most
‘punters,’ rarely did win.

My uncle’s main passion was the horses, but he often had a bet on the football
at the weekend. This was generally a straight ‘win’ bet on one team, but he
sometimes combined two or three bets into a double or treble. My uncle
couldn’t have dreamed of the type of bets we can place today and I often
wonder what he would make of them. Betting exchanges allow us to bet on
everything from who will score the first goal in a match to how many red cards
there will be. I regard most of these as pure speculation like tossing a coin, but
some do offer some very interesting betting opportunities.

The strategy I will describe in this guide is one based on a market on Betfair I
only discovered a few months ago. I tested dozens of strategies and
approaches, and this is one of the most consistently profitable. I hope that my
approach may give you other ideas and that this may be the seed of you
developing your own betting strategies. I will describe the system in detail,
showing screenshots and walking you through a real life example.

Let’s begin and see what profits can be made from those glorious goals!
The System
My Glorious Goals system has been developed to use the ‘Both Teams To
Score’ market on Betfair. This bet is also available from many of the
mainstream bookmakers, but I find the odds slightly better on Betfair. This is
basically ‘what it says on the tin’ – we are betting that both teams in a match
will score at least one goal. It doesn’t matter if the end result is 7-1, so long as
both teams score!

The bet is very simple ‘Yes’ or ‘No,’ and in this system we are looking for
opportunities to bet on ‘Yes.’ I’ve experimented with the ‘No’ bet and have
several ideas in test. So far I find the odds make it difficult to profit.

Some of the considerations for this bet include –

- Recent form of the team and their goal scoring ability. Team form
changes very quickly, and one or two players can make a big difference
when it comes to scoring
- League positions. Two teams close in the table and with a good scoring
record are a potential bet. I’ve also noticed that teams in the bottom of
the table have a tendency to score against the odds – possibly because
they have little to lose and so go on the attack!
- Top of the table clashes. These are often played with more cautious
tactics, and goals are less likely as a result
- Teams which have a track record of keeping a ‘clean sheet’ – these are
to be avoided

You don’t have to follow football or have any interest in it to use this system. I
will set out the rules I follow for choosing bets to make things very clear. I
personally believe in ‘efficient market theory’ anyway. By that I mean if Wayne
Rooney has scored in his last three matches and is suddenly out with an injury,
the odds of United to win will reflect that because every other punter and
bookie knows it. You may choose to use your own knowledge of what’s
happening in football, but I don’t think it’s really necessary unless you have
some real ‘inside information!’
The Rules
Don’t worry about having to spend hours researching teams and their recent
performance to find potential bets. All the work is done for us at
www.soccerstats.com. If you don’t know this website, it’s an incredible
resource for football betting. Take a look at the amount of data that’s
available. It’s all completely free – no subscriptions or payments required.

For this system, we start by navigating to the ‘Matches’ section. You can see
this in the ‘banner’ at the top of Soccerstats.com. Click on this and you’ll be
taken to the data tables. I generally look the night before the games are played
or early in the morning. This is great as it means we can place bets and ‘set and
forget’ them – ideal if you work or have other commitments during the day.
You can see below the table of information we’re looking for.

Step one is to scan down the ‘BTS’ (Both Teams Score) column for both teams
playing a match. We need both teams to have a percentage of at least 60%.

On this table you should spot 3 matches as follows –

1) Manchester C (60%) v Swansea City (60%)

2) Everton (60%) v West Ham Utd (100%)
3) Arsenal (80%) v Manchester U (60%)

Leicester v Sunderland doesn’t qualify, as although Leicester has a high BTS

score of 80%, Sunderland’s in only 40%.

For Step 2 we now look at the ‘Over’ column. The rating must be 50% or more
for both teams for the match to qualify. The ‘Over’ data is the percentage of
matches the team has played in where there have been over 2.5 goals. I know
‘over 2.5 goals’ confuses some people (how can you score half a goal?!) but
don’t worry about it. What it means for this system is that over 50% of their
matches have 3 goals or more. The key to this system is of course matches
with goals!

Going back to our example, can you see how the initial 3 selections are
impacted by the second stage?

The Man City match is ruled out, as City’s Over rating is only 40%. Similarly, the
Man U match is out as United’s rating is only 40%. Remember both teams in
match must be rated 50% or more for Over.

The Over ratings for Everton and West Ham are 80% and 100% respectively, so
this match is still a qualifier.
We now move on to the final step. For this we need two pieces of data. ‘CS’
means ‘clean sheet’ and ‘FTS’ is ‘failed to score.’ Write these down for both
teams playing in the match.

In our example, this is as follows.

Everton – CS 40%, FTS 20%

West Ham – CS 0%, FTS 0%

Add the total for all of these together. We need the figure to be 100% or less.
In our example, the total is 60%, so we have a qualifying bet (40+20+0+0).

Just to explain the use of this data. Firstly, we don’t want teams which are
keeping a clean sheet (not conceding goals) too often. Also, we don’t want
teams which aren’t scoring often (‘failed to score’). Remember, we want teams
capable of scoring but which also concede goals. If a team is playing with a very
tight defence and scoring the odd goal, it’s not good for this system. If a team
is conceding goals but not able to score, it’s not good for this strategy.

We now have a selection so it’s time to see what odds are available.

There are several ways to navigate to the ‘Both teams to score’ market on
Betfair. If you go to the ‘Football’ section and click on a match you’ll see it – it
may mean some scrolling down as it’s not one of the most popular bets. You
may not find it at all for some ‘fringe’ games and I’ll cover this later.
Here’s what it looks like on Bet365 –

Here I’ve navigated to the bets for the match Aston Villa V Liverpool, and you
can see ‘Both Teams To Score’ after a little scrolling down.

Just for info, the Everton v West Ham game in our example ended 2-1 – both
teams scored and this was another win for the system.
Match Selections and Other
Considerations

Ok I hope the system is now clear. If not, please read the steps required and
run through the example again. Spend some time looking at Soccerstats.com
and your preferred betting site to see where the ‘Both teams to score’ bets
appear.

In theory you can use this system for any matches where the data is available.
I’ve stuck with the main leagues for England, Scotland, Spain, Italy and
Germany. You may not find a ‘Both teams to score’ bet available for less
popular matches. There are plenty of bets available, so don’t worry if you have
to let the odd one pass.

In terms of bet size, as always I advise that you paper trade the system at first.
I’d suggest level stakes bets of around 4%-5% of your bank. So for a £200 bank
I’d bet £8-£10 per match. Odds are often low for these bets, so consider using
a staking plan if you’re comfortable with this approach and have a bank set
aside.

Another approach I’ve tested is to combine two or three matches into a single
bet, and this can ratchet your profits. Bookmaker sites handle these bets in
different ways, but it’s generally by adding more than one match to a betting
slip and selecting the ‘double.’ As an example I combined a 1.61 odds bet with
a 1.95 one over the weekend to get odds of 3.15, and made a very nice £60+
profit from a relatively ‘low risk’ £20 bet.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the guide and that you have success with the system.
Feel free to adapt it to your own needs and add further steps to the selection
process if you can spot a way of increasing the profits.

You can contact me at [email protected] with any ideas or

feedback. I do have other football systems available so drop me an email if
you’d like details.