Spread Betting Guide Page 2
Total Goals Explained
As briefly mentioned before, the most popular market for spread betting is the total goals market in football. This is probably because it is the most exciting part of a football match, the amount of goals which are scored, and is the most important (no one is really that bothered about the total corners in the match), its far easier and more fun to predict the total goals in a match.
In my opinion the most confusing part of the total goals market is the figure which is set by the spread betting firm. Usually it is quoted as "2.4 - 2.7 goals." When I first saw this I was wondering how can there be .4 of a goal. Later on I realised that this is only to eliminate the possibility of their being an inbetween-value. For example, if there were 3 goals quoted for a match, and you could only go higher and buy a stake, or go lower and sell a stake, what would happen if exactly 3 goals were scored? This wouldn't really be fair, as both sides of the bet will be eliminated.
You can see from the image above that when the total goal is set as one whole number (the number 3 in the image above), if this turns out to be the total amount of goals scored then both sides of the bet will be void, and lose (you can't back the quoted total number of goals, you must either go higher and buy, or go lower and sell.
You can see from this example that when the total goals are set as 2.4 - 2.7, there is no possibility of bets being void or losing - you must go higher or lower as there is no middle value (even though you aren't allowed to back the quoted figure normally) but this sorts out the problem of the middle value. This is why they don't use a single whole number when quoting the total goals market.
Please Note: When you start spread betting for profit, make sure that you have covered both sides of the bet. At one spread betting firm if you choose to go higher and buy, you must remember to go lower and sell with a different spread betting firm. Otherwise you will probably end up losing money (depending on the outcome of the event). Remember to check and double check the bets you make at the spread betting firms, otherwise your losses could spiral out of control.
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