Asian Handicap betting offers a lot of coverage for your bets because of the options available in taking half and quarter options. In moving the outcome of a football match from three outcomes down to two by eliminating the draw, then it can also prove quite valuable and far more appealing than the traditional handicap markets.
The Key Difference
A Real Madrid -1 traditional handicap means that you would need Los Merengues to win their match by at least two goals. If they were to do it by just the one goal then your bet on the -1 handicap would be lost because you didn’t beat the offer.
However, a Real Madrid -1 Asian Handicap is a different beast. There is no loss if the handicap outcome ends up level. If Real Madrid won by a 1 goal margin then you would have received a stake refund on an Asian Handicap, essentially a Draw No Bet there.
Underdog Asian Handicap Options
If you are looking at an Asian Handicap option on an underdog then you are looking at the ‘plus’ options. A +1 Asian Handicap on a team means that even if that underdog draws you will get the win. If they were to lose the game by the one-goal margin then you would get a stake refund.
So you can see the value on the Asian Handicap markets. Here we are going to look at a strategy for backing an underdog team who are playing at home.
The basic assumption for this is that a home team underdog doesn’t often lose by two or more goals. We like our stays so let’s go look at some numbers of the worst teams in the 2017/18 Premier League, Stoke, Swansea and West Brom.
Swansea
10 home defeats, 3 by at least two goals
Stoke
9 home defeats, 3 by at least two goals
West Brom
7 home defeats, 2 by at least two goals
So you see, even the worst teams in the league don’t suffer big defeats with any particular regularity. You have about a third of all defeats for each of those being by two or more goals. Of course, that is just looking at the three teams which got relegated. Start moving up the table and you find less regularity of big home defeats for home underdogs.
The Strategy
So what is the strategy? Well, normally you would look around the +1.0 or the +1.25 Asian Handicap mark to cover an underdog. But in taking into consideration the underdog playing at home, then it could be worth, for a chop in odds, extending the coverage by looking at a +1.75 Asian Handicap on a home underdog. That will be dependent on the odds of course.
We took a look at real odds from a Newcastle v Arsenal Premier League game in September 2018. The odds are from bookmaker bet365 who we recommend for Asian Handicap betting. Newcastle were 10/3 underdogs in the match outright because at the time they were W0 D1 L3 for the season.
The odds on the Newcastle +1.5 Asian Handicap were 1.35 decimal at the time and this is part of the strategy. Low odds for lower risk. It’s not a shoot-for-the-moon kind of strategy, but it is popular. Newcastle had already lost at home to Spurs and Chelsea for the season, two other top teams, but only by a one-goal margin in each.
The Newcastle +1.75 Asian Handicap was at 1.24 decimal but the balance of the +1.50 appealed more. That gave us a win on Newcastle if they Won, if they Drew or if they lost by just one goal. That’s a lot of coverage on a home side underdog. This is another great feature of Asian Handicap betting, the flexibility that you get in finding the exact betting opportunity that suits your plans.
Summary
So that’s it. A simple look at a pretty straightforward Asian Handicap based on underdogs not getting beaten heavily at home. Always look at the stats because you can see teams who generally only lose by tight margins on home soil. Others, they just can’t stop leaking goals and losing more frequently by more than one goal. In the 2017/18 Premier League, for example, Huddersfield suffered eight home defeats and six of those were by at least two goals. The Terriers would have been one to avoid. Burnley, on the other hand, lost seven home games, just one of those was by more than a goal. Do your homework and look for those opportunities.
