The most popular way to bet on football is on the outright win-draw-win market. This betting market allows you to bet on a team to win, or the match to be a draw.

In almost every instance you will get one team as favourite to win and the other team will be the outsider with the odds on the draw being pitched somewhere in between. Although people say bookmakers are never wrong, sometimes they over compensate for a favourite and their odds are therefore too short, leaving the value bet in the draw or the other team to win.

The best example of this is when the ‘better’ team are playing away from home. You will regularly see a strong away team under-priced on the betting market and this leaves the value in the draw bet or a bet on the home team to win, at more attractive odds. Using this football betting system also works if you are looking at accumulator bets, our advice would be to avoid short priced away teams in any multiple bets. Despite them being the stronger side on paper a look at their opposition is key and there are certainly some teams where the bigger clubs do not like to play e.g. Everton, Fulham and Sunderland.

When the ‘better’ team are playing at home you will often see some very unattractive odds e.g. 1/3, 1/4 or shorter. These odds are no good to the standard punter (betting £4 to get a return of £5 is hardly a fool-proof system) and in this instance picking a couple of short price home teams for an accumulator could be the better betting system, although the more selections you choose the bigger the risk.

Finally you could look at a betting system surrounding the draw market. When two teams are closely matched you will often find a short price for the draw (around 2/1) and these are probably best avoided but if the favourite is playing away from home the odds for the draw could be anything over 5/2, giving a respectable betting proposition and the value of the match.

The key with betting on the win-draw-win market is you have a good knowledge of the teams including any injuries or suspensions, the current form of both teams (both home and away) and the history of the fixture in question.
 If you stick to these simple rules then the system of betting on the outright market could make your football betting profitable.