Factors that influence football bettors’ decisions
There are hundreds, maybe thousands, of factors that influence who you bet on. Football betting is a very popular pastime for fans of the sport and for those who like to place bets, there are many factors which can influence your decision when making a selection. Something as simple as if you are hungry or not might impact a bet. Your desire for food will make your brain do whatever it takes to stop thinking about what bet to place so that you can focus on finding food! So let’s focus on some of the more common ones in this guide to factors that influence football bettors’ decisions!
Players
Even when just considering team x beating team y, it is important to know how individual players are performing when going into a game. If you place bets that rely on the scoreline, or even in-play bets that rely on the number of corners or keeping a clean sheet, it is even more important to know about individual teams and players.
This could be as simple as thinking about their current form or if they are coming back from injury. At certain times of the year, it’s also worth considering if players have to undertake international duties.
Teams
Thinking about individual players is fine, but a single player won’t either make or break entire team.
And it isn’t always all about the players. There may have been management changes which can influence the atmosphere in the dressing room.
Bettors should also take into account how a team’s previous form has been? Or if the upcoming match significant for the team? These are all team-related questions you should ask yourself when making a bet.
In several of our posts, we discuss the importance of having up-to-date team news before placing your bet for exactly this reason.
Current rankings
A very naive way to bet would be to say “this team are at the top of the league, and this team are near the bottom, so the first team will win”. This may often be the case, but it is worth considering the wider context.
If a team have all but won the league, they may field more junior players against what they would consider to be weaker teams. This will impact the in-play odds a fair amount.
Equally, a team who needs to get 3 points to get out of the relegation zone are much more likely to give it everything than they did maybe three weeks ago when they felt quite secure in their position.
Personal attitudes
People have different inbuilt attitudes to betting, from which teams they will always/never bet on if they will only do sports betting on favourites, or will they give underdogs a chance.
We suggest that you remove personal attitudes as much as possible. You may dislike the team, but if the odds are right and the data suggests they will be profitable, then perhaps you need to set aside personal feelings and bet with your head, not your heart.
One of our most frequent questions is about how we could turn tips we’ve given on a particular day into an accumulator. This is because some people have a strong preference for accumulator betting.
Of course, some bets lend themselves very well to accumulator betting, but we try to steer people clear of doing it for the sake of doing it because we feel people should instead try and focus on losing less often.
Odds given
The final thing we want to cover about what can influence a football bettor’s decision-making process is the odds presented to them.
Sometimes the odds your bookie gives you seem too good to be true, and this can heavily influence how you place your bets.
To try and avoid getting sucked into betting how your bookie wants you to bet, we always suggest shopping around. Not only will you get more data to help inform your bet, but you might also find better odds for a bet you were going to place anyway!