Half-time/Full-time prediction

The half-time and full-time football prediction betting market is blossoming in Africa and is proving one of the most popular means to increase win odds.

As mentioned earlier almost all leading online betting sites in Kenya offer this option, scroll above to see some examples from Kenya alone. Countries with top sports betting sites like Nigeria, Tanzania, Zambia and Uganda also offer this feature on a daily basis.

The premise of this bet is for the punter to accurately predict which side will lead at half-time and then ultimately win the game.

An example we will use can be the Real Madrid versus Atletico Madrid derby, being played at the Bernadeau Stadium.

With Real Madrid playing at home they will be denoted as 1, while Atletico (away team) will carry the 2 tag, and X equates to the half/match being a draw.

This bet market offers plenty of action on one game, with many variants of the results being possible.

Real could lose the first half and come back and win the second before going on to capture the three points.

So the punter’s half-time prediction will generally look like ‘matchcode#HT/FT#211#amount.

This means that Los Blanco will lose the first half (denoted by a 2) and then winning the second half (1) and finally the match (1).

Many sites have a slight variance with regard to their way of betting, via SMS or on the site but a similar pattern is used; namely, matchcode, HT/FT followed by the predicted results respectively.

This form of betting on the market allows the punter an opportunity to increase odds as well as fine-tune research. The data analysis can be done by the computer generated bookmaker odds or by personal research into the form of the respective teams.

A good example of this pattern-betting is looking at the historical data on Manchester United, who under Alex Ferguson, would often come back from a losing position and win the match in the dying embers. One only has to think back to their memorable Champions League win against Bayern Munich, where they scored two goals in injury time to clinch the title.

Many Manchester United teams over the recent seasons have been slow-starters to a game and as the Old Trafford crowd gets into the game their side increases their tempo. This is a systemic belief in their ability to rise up and win no matter the half-time deficit.

Another classic example is when Liverpool overturned a 3-0 half-time deficit to defeat AC Milan in the Champions League final, winning on penalties after the match was deadlocked at 3-3. For the punter to have won a substantial amoi8nt on that particular game and given that Liverpool were the away team, their slip would have read ‘matchcode#12Xamount.

The reason for the draw (X) at the end is that most betting sites operate on a 90 minute/full-time pay-out and does not reward punters in extra time or penalty shootouts with regard to a win prediction. The end result would be declared a draw, unless otherwise bet upon, e.g. betting that Liverpool would win on penalties.