Soccer Betting Tips, Previews & News

There are few sports that have the power to unite Australia like the world game.

Soccer, football, futbol or the ‘beautiful game’ — no matter what you call it, there’s no doubt that it’s the biggest sport in the world.

Australians have a comprehensive service when it comes to betting on soccer, with almost every major online bookmaker offering a full suite of markets on both domestic and international games.

While we have the Socceroos and A-League to follow on our own shores, it’s in Europe where the world’s best players ply their trade.

In our soccer betting guide below we’ll take you through the best bookies for soccer betting, all the popular soccer gambling markets and the biggest tournaments and competitions from all around the world.

If your bookmaker doesn’t offer the full suite of local and global soccer markets with competitive odds, every single week, it’s time to find a new bookmaker.

When the Socceroos play, you can be sure that our major recommended bookies will offer specials on our national team.

There are also ongoing multi specials during the course of the A-League and EPL seasons and during the UEFA Champions League and the all-encompassing FIFA World Cup, bookmakers will clamour over themselves to offer you the best deal.

Make sure that you’re browsing through all of your options and finding the deals and odds that provide the best pay outs.

There are few sports that offer more markets in an average game than soccer.

In just your average international or EPL match punters could have as much as 400 markets to choose from. There’s also an enormous amount of futures markets for different tournaments, competitions and individual awards for savvy punters.

Scroll through the drop list below to find out how the most popular soccer betting markets work:

Match result:

Given the propensity of draws in any given game of soccer game, betting on the result of the game isn’t quite the 50/50 affair you’ll see in most other sports.

There are three options for punters to choose from in this market, for example:

1. Newcastle @ $3.00
2. Draw @ $3.50
3. Liverpool @ $2.50

Double chance:

Double chance gives punters the option to combine two possible outcomes in one bet. The two options often look like this:

1. Newcastle to win or draw @ $2.50
2. Liverpool to win or draw @ $1.80

Draw no bet:

This market essentially eliminates the draw from betting. You can pick either team to win the game and if it ends in a draw, your bet is refunded to you.

First goal-scorer:

This market is as advertised – if you can successfully pick the first player to score in a game, you’ll get quality returns.

Anytime goal-scorer:

While the odds aren’t as good as the first goal-scorer, the anytime goal-scorer pays out when your selected player scores at any time during the game, including from a penalty in general play, but not in a penalty shoot-out at the end of a game.

Half-time/full-time double:

The half-time/full-time double betting market requires punters to successfully pick the result of the game at the end of both halves.

Given either half can end in one team leading or a draw, there are nine possible outcomes to choose from when betting.

Goal lines and handicaps:

Bookmaker can often assign a team more heavily-favoured to win with a goal line or handicap to provide a more even betting contest.

For example, if the bookmakers offer Newcastle +1 vs. Liverpool -1 in betting, it means that Liverpool must win by more than one goal to cover their handicap.

Goal lines are given for the total score of the match. If a line is set at +2.5, it means the match has to be over three goals to cover.

Correct score bets:

Correct score betting requires punters to correctly choose the exact score from both sides at the end of a game.

Given the amount of different possible outcomes, this is a market that is difficult to choose, but rewarding to win on.

Both teams to score:

If you suspect a high-scoring affair or have two teams coming up against one another that are more offensively-minded than average, this can be a profitable market.

Clean sheet:

A ‘clean sheet’ means to keep one side scoreless throughout the entire game and can be a handy betting option for punters who sense a dour affair against a quality defensive opposition.

Given the busy schedules, long seasons and large number of games on every week all over the world, the multi bet is a popular tool to maximise odds.

Because the uneven nature of some leagues like the English Premier League, sometimes punters need to accumulate a number of results together, just to get up to an even $2 return for their outlay.

Knowing the popularity of this kind of bet, bookmakers will often offer 3 and 4-leg multi specials that have been known to offer bonus bets back for near-misses or increased odds for successes.

As long as you’re betting on different matches, even from different leagues, the multi bet allows you to bring together different markets like margins, first goal scorer, player exotics and results into one bet. Here is an example:

Australia to beat England @ $4

Combined multi odds = $66.24

The world game is played at a variety of different levels throughout the world, meaning there is no shortage of professional games being played at any given time to bet on.

A majority of the action takes place across Europe, but there are global tournaments and international events for punters to dissect.

International tournaments:

• FIFA World Cup*
• UEFA European Championship
• FIFA Women’s World Cup*
• FIFA Youth World Cup*
• AFC Asian Cup*
• CAF Africa Cup of Nations
• CONMEBOL Copa America
• CONCACAF Gold Cup
• Olympic Games*

*denotes which tournaments Australia can qualify for and compete in.

Club football competitions:

Australia & Asia:

• A-League
• Australian FFA Cup
• AFC Champions League
• Chinese Super League
• J-League

Europe & UEFA:

• Champions League
• Europa League

England:

• English Premier League
• English Championship
• Football League Cup
• English League One
• English League Two
• FA Cup

Scotland & Ireland:

• Scottish Premiership
• Scottish Cup
• Scottish Championship
• Scottish League One
• Scottish League Two

Italy:

• Serie A
• Serie B
• Lega Pro

• La Liga
• Segunda Division

• Bundesliga
• Bundesliga II

North & South America:

• US Major League Soccer
• Argentine Primera Division
• Brazilian Serie A
• Copa Colombia
• Uruguayan Primera Division

Following the different soccer leagues throughout the world can prove to be a difficult job, given the wide list of professional leagues and conflicting dates and time zones.

For Australian punters, the most popular betting markets are the Socceroos international games, the English Premier League, the FIFA World Cup and the domestic A-League.

The FIFA World Cup is held every four years and played over one month. Nations compete in World Cup qualifiers more than two years out from the global event. Australia has competed in every World Cup since 2006 and will have to earn qualification again for the 2022 tournament, which is set to be held in Qatar.

The A-League season is played over 27 rounds and also includes a month-long finals series, played from October to May.

The English Premier League is played over 38 weeks and competed on by 20 teams from August all the way through to May.

There are a variety of streaming options for soccer fans and your choices will be dictated by which games you’d like to see from around the world.

If you are watching the Australian national team, the Socceroos, you’ll be able to catch every game for free on SBS On Demand.

If you are watching the A-League, you’ll have to get a subscription to Foxtel or Kayo, but there are also certain games broadcast for free on TENBold and as part of being a customer at Telstra.

The English Premier League is streamed exclusively on Optus.