Football is the world’s game for a very good reason it has unrivalled excitement and passion. It is this excitement and passion that makes millions of people around the world believe that kicking a leather ball around a pitch is more important than life itself. As the famous Liverpool manager Bill Shankly once said “Some people think football is a matter of life and death. I assure you, it's much more serious than that.”

One of the reasons millions of people love football so much is the unpredictability of the game. For example if I asked you to predict the result of a soccer game with 12 minutes to go with a score line of 4-0 you would probably go with a win to the team 4 up and yes statistically speaking you would be right to do so. However strange things have happened (mainly at sea) in a game.

It is the fact that it only takes a couple of seconds to score a goal. A silly foul can give away an innocuous free-kick and then 2 seconds later bang GOAL and the game is turned on its head!

The unpredictability of football matches has spurned a whole new way of betting and gambling on football. In-play betting is the new kid on the block and with the increased broadband penetration across most of the western world there is a real buzz out there.

Betting on a Live Match

So here are some of the reasons why you might like to give live online betting or in-play betting a go for your favourite football team:

Statistically speaking a large number of top level football matches are goalless at half time which means there is a brilliant opportunity to make money from in-play betting. The reason for there being few goals in the first half are countless such as fitness levels are higher in the first half and therefore fewer mistakes, the teams are initially “cagey” about committing too many players forwards etc.

If the game is goalless at half time the odds for a specific result change compared to that at the start of the game and are constantly changing throughout the game irrespective of any goals being scored. Simple changes in the dynamics of the game i.e. substitutions, red cards, injuries (and the resulting injury time) and general game statistics like possession will all cause the live odds to change.

The real money is not made in the prediction of a draw as these betting odds will shorten the longer the game goes on but in the lengthening of the odds of the favourites as the game remains a draw. This means that the odds someone playing “in-play” will get are significantly better than those they would get at the start of the game.