In the world of Football betting (Soccer for our overseas visitors) there has been quite a shift in betting patterns over the last few years. We have seen massive growth in the Football betting markets. Perhaps more interesting for the punter though has been the rise of Asian Handicap Betting.

If you have heard the phrase, but did not no what it meant, you are in the right place. Asian Handicapping put simply removes the draw from the equation and ads a handicap to one of the teams. For those who are more used to betting on two outcome sports such as American Football or Basketball this can be a real boost as it means that betting systems can be carried over to Football without having to be rewritten in their entirety.

However, before we get too excited we must remember that the odds after removing the draw have been balanced carefully by the bookmaker. There is also a weighting or ‘spread’ in the bet. For example in a traditional bet you have the following choices…

Tottenham
Stoke
Draw

In an Asian Handicap bet you will see a Handicap or spread applied for example Tottenham might be favourites to win and will have a 1.5 Goal handicap…

Tottenham –1.5
Stoke +1.5

So you see, if you selected Tottenham, they would have to beat Stoke by 2 goals for you to win. If you selected Stoke, then you would win the bet if they don’t get beaten by at least 2 goals.

Of course this means that if you ‘know’ that Tottenham are going to beat Stoke, but you suspect by only 1 goal, you are better off betting the traditional way and making the best of the odds.

There is also another form of Asian Handicap, which is the Quarter Goal Handicap. We will be going into that a bit more in a future article.

Don’t forget to get control of your betting bank before you branch out into new markets. Profit after all, is the long term goal.

Happy Betting!