6 Top Tips For Avoiding 'Mug' Football Bets

Unless you have been living under a rock this week, you won’t have failed to notice the fact the English football season gets back underway tomorrow, and with it the chance to make money betting once again.

But did you know that less than 3% of all gamblers actually make a profit from their betting? Or written another way – 97% either break even or make a loss?

It’s a sobering stat and goes a long way to explaining just why it is key to have the right information and guidance when it comes to betting. Without it, you are likely to form one of the 97% that lose.

To help you become part of the 3% elite, YOU need to know two things.

1) What to bet on; and more importantly
2) What not to bet on.

As punters, we often waste so much money on bets that we should quite simply just avoid.  Today I want to help you identify these bets with the help of our new season Football Betting & Tipster Guide. In this we interviewed 10 of the best football brains for their help, tips and expertise on the new season ahead.

One of the key questions I asked was: “What kind of bets – however attractive they seem on paper – should SBC members avoid at all costs?”

Here then, without further ado are my top 6 tips on avoiding mug football bets (the type the 3% of winning punters don’t touch!) for the new season:

1. AVOID Bets the bookies push on you
Ex-bookmaker Phil Brown knows a thing or two about how bookies make their money and his advice is to avoid “The classical billboard/shop window advertising bets that the bookmaker wants you to place. These are usually bets such as score-casts which offer around half the odds you should be getting.” Remember if the bookies want you to place a bet, it’s because it makes them money!

2. AVOID Bets where the market offers no value
Checking out the margins on any given book was Matt Love’s top tip with his advice to “avoid any bet in a market that doesn’t have a minimum of a 97% book. If the bookies are taking a big cut you’ve got to beat them just to breakeven.”

Note – This is easily done when using a service like Oddsportal, where the odds for the Everton – Man U game show books ranging from 98.1% to 90.6%.

3. Avoid Bets Where You Don’t Cut It!
Being honest and eliminating bets where you just don’t cut the mustard is ex-pro footballer Goran Trpevski’s top tip. He learnt to recognise how poor he was at under 2.5 goals markets and its paid dividends as he explains… “I am perhaps the worst on this planet for picking under 2.5 goals. I stopped playing unders a long time ago and then some 6 months ago I was very confident one game would go under. Inter v Palermo on a rainy San Siro and it finished 6-4!”.

“However, (the good news) is that I know I am bad in this area, 99% of the punters don’t even know what they are good or bad on. I am a fantastic punter, but I also know where I struggle and that’s a great start. Use your strengths and hide your weaknesses.

4. AVOID Overstaking
One quick way to lose money is by simply betting too much and not working to a set plan or betting bank. Top tipster Graeme Dand explained “Overstaking is one of the most common mistakes people make betting in my experience and it very rarely works out in their favour“.

5. AVOID Obvious Favourites
Mike from Football Value’s recommends punters “try to avoid the big favourites and the bets that just seem too easy and obvious”. As he explains “The unexpected actually happens, and at the extremely low prices (for some favourites) it just isn’t worth your money“.

6. AVOID Accumulators
Our final advice comes from James L of Summer of Football whose short and sweet answer is for punters to avoid Accumulators as they “are a bookmakers dream”. He has a point as whilst the odds can be huge, they very rarely come in and cannot be relied upon.

Knowing The Best Football Experts To Follow

All of the above is taken from our newly released 2012/13 Best Football Betting & Tipster Guide, which is available free to all SBC members.

The guide features:

  • Our unique football tipsters rankings and ratings for next season.
  • Best buy tipster tables split into: biggest profit, easiest to follow, best budget tipster, best for high stakes.
  • Interviews with all the best experts and their take on the new season, where they see profit can be made, ante-post tips and which teams are over and under-rated.
  • The latest on the fantastic Fink Tank football system + plus how all SBC members can get its weekly tips for free via email.

Sign-up here for your membership to the Smart Betting Club and start making increased profits with our 2012/13 Best Football Betting & Tipster Guide (plus take advantage of our no quibble money back guarantee).