In today’s Bet Dynamo blog article we want to write about successful money management of your betting bank. First of all let’s have a wee chat about value betting. What makes a value bet is that you’ve recognised that you’re getting better odds than what you think should be offered. Now this might just be instinctual or a gut feeling. Of course, here at Bet Dynamo we give you the stats and compare them with bookies’ odds on our Bet Dynamo Insights Page to see the implied probability chances of an event occurring in a match too. If you’re not a member, you should sign up here and start bashing those bookies from today!

How Much to Bet when Betting on Football?

Once you’ve found some value in the market though now you have a tough choice to make, how much should you bet? Should you lump it all in? No, that would destroy your betting bank should the result go the wrong way for you. Successful Betting Bankroll management is a fundamental part of sports betting and we need to protect our bank as much as possible because as well all know; we cannot possibly win every bet and losing runs will occur.

Level Staking

One of the easiest and most popular of staking strategies, this is where you always risk the same amount of your bankroll regardless of the odds. Over 2.5 goals in an upcoming West Ham vs Leicester City game is on offer for 1.96, you bet £10. Both Teams to Score is 2.35 in Burnley vs Liverpool and again you bet £10.

Percentage Staking

Percentage staking is also a very popular method of protecting your betting bank. As you win more bets you risk more money and if you experience a losing streak your bankroll is protected because you’re risking less.

However, if you remember your primary school Greek mythology there was the story of Achilles and the turtle; Achilles could never catch the turtle because the distance would keep halving the closer he got. One of those paradoxes the Greeks used to love so much in their philosophy. Obviously you can still lose your entire bankroll but with percentage staking there is, at least, a level of protecting yourself.

When winning it can be something of a slow process and it can be tempting to get a bit over eager when placing bets when you’re enjoying a successful spell when betting. However, discipline is the key and you need to look at this as a long term project just like any business project. The major flaw with this strategy is that it doesn’t take the different betting odds into account. Should you bet the same percentage on odds of 2.15 as you would on something that’s 1.75? Many would say yes, while other punters would say no.

Staking Based on Betting Odds

This is similar to the percentage staking method above but slightly different because it actually does take the bookies’ odds into account. For example, if you’re betting 5% of your £1000 bankroll on BTTS in a Celta Vigo vs Real Madrid match at 2.00 that would be £50. But what if there’s a horse running later today at Fairyhouse at 11.0. Would you put £50 on a longshot? No, so you need to calculate what you should risk. Here’s the formula:

(£1000 * 0.05) / (11.00 -1) = 5

The problem with this formula is that with short odds you need to risk more, so something like 1.55, what would you bother risking it?

(£1000 * 0.05) / (1.55 - 1) = 90, so you’re betting £40 more than what you would have risked at odds of 2.0 above.

The Kelly Criterion

This staking method takes into account both the probability of an event occurring and the value of the odds offered regarding that probability. The resulting figure is called ‘the overlay’.

Here’s the formula: Value = (% probability multiplied by decimal odds) minus 100%

Over the years there have been a few changes to the Kelly Criterion and professional bettors in particular have found it quite useful. If you do some maths on that formula you’ll quickly see that it can sometimes recommend massive bets and thanks to this some people prefer to use the half or quarter Kelly, so taking the recommended stake and halving, or quartering it etc. The biggest con of the Kelly Criterion is that you cannot have multiple bets on matches occurring at the same time. You need to have strong discipline with this staking method and always stick to the plan.

What then should we do with all these possibilities? Well, something like a 10% or 5% Kelly might be to your liking. Here’s an example: Your bankroll is £1000, and you are betting on Manchester City vs PSG. You fancy the home side in the Asian Handicap market so you’re going with Man City AH -1, priced 2.10. You’ve done your research and you’ve decided that for this bet to win it has a a probability of 50%. The recommended bet amount would £45.45. (bankroll * chosen fraction) * (overlay/(odds - 1)) i.e (£1000 * 10%) * (50% / 1.10) (£100) * (45.45%) = £45.45

We know that all this maths can be a bit tough for newbie bettors, but thankfully there are plenty of Kelly Criterion calculators around the web so do make use of them

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