3 Common Sports Betting Mistakes to Avoid
If you’re new to sports betting, you may be eager to get many winnings right off the bat. It’s essential to understand that sports betting is a challenging pursuit, and there’s a lot to master. In fact, you can maximise your losses by identifying and avoiding common mistakes.
By following the tips below, you will be able to make better betting decisions, regardless of your experience level, whether you use Lottoland football betting or any other reliable sportsbook.
Unit Size Changing
Successful sports betting requires discipline in money management, which may be the most important aspect of the betting. For example, one common mistake among bettors is adjusting their unit size based on recent performance, which can lead to overconfidence or desperation.
To avoid these pitfalls, we recommend a flat-betting approach for most bettors. Flat betting involves wagering the same amount on every game and using only 1% to 5% of your bankroll per bet, with a suggested medium of 3%. So, for example, if you have £100, you would use £3 per bet, while if you have £1,000, you will use £30 per bet.
Using a flat-betting approach helps bettors winning more bets. However, it’s important to note that flat betting should only be used unless you have a true, quantifiable edge on certain bets.
Not doing your research
It’s unwise to bet on a wager without having the necessary knowledge. Such a move is tantamount to throwing your money away.
Conducting research goes beyond simply perusing betting prediction sites. For example, it would be best if you kept up with injury updates on your favourite players or teams, as well as examining past match-ups between two teams. You could even scrutinise weather forecasts to determine if external factors like wind or heat might affect players’ performance.
Focusing on a specific niche might make it easier to make informed decisions. For instance, if you’re an avid football fan, you could limit your bets to a certain league. By researching this league’s teams exclusively, you can assess your success rate. Then, once you feel comfortable at that level, you can consider branching out to other leagues or sports.
Paying too much attention to Recent Trends
Novice bettors often make the mistake of placing their bets based on a team’s recent performance. They tend to bet on teams that have been playing well or are on a winning streak and fade teams that have just suffered a loss or are on a losing streak. However, this approach is flawed since, historically, teams that have just won are often overvalued, and teams that have just lost are undervalued.
For instance, if Liverpool won their last game by 3 points, oddsmakers might set the opening line for the next game at -1.5 or -2 instead of the true opener of -2, knowing that the public will still bet on Liverpool. This inflated line value means that bettors are getting an overpriced number, which is not a good value for their money.
Therefore, novice bettors should avoid betting based solely on recent performance and instead focus on the fundamental factors that determine the outcome of a game.
Gambler’s Fallacy
Gamblers’ Fallacy is a cognitive bias that occurs when people believe that previous events or outcomes can influence future random events or outcomes, although the two are independent of each other. In other words, the Gambler’s Fallacy is the belief that if an event occurs unusually often during a given period, it will happen less often in the future, and vice versa.
For example, a person who flips a coin and gets heads five times in a row might believe that the next flip is more likely to result in tails, even though the probability of getting heads or tails on any given flip is always 50%.
This fallacy is often seen in gambling situations, where bettors may believe that they are “due” for a win because they have lost several times in a row. In reality, each event is independent and has no influence on the next.
It is important to recognise and avoid Gamblers Fallacy, as it can lead to poor decision-making.
