One of the longest serving betting markets is the half time full time betting market, used for many years. Alongside the correct score betting, this was one of the first alternative markets offered by bookmakers and regularly appeared on football coupons up and down the country.
The market is nowhere near as popular as it once was, due to the amount of new markets we have available to bet on now. However, it can still offer the punter a great bit of value and it is still something worth looking at when you are placing your football bets. With markets like the both teams to score market and the over/under goals market, the half time full-time market is often lost, resulting in some good prices being available for punters.
You can use the half time full-time market to enhance the price of a selection your fancy strongly, backing them to be winning the game at both half time and full time. The second way to use the market is to enhance the odds of a draw when you are backing a draw. The final way to use it is to perm together outcomes with long odds, where one team is winning at half time, but the other wins at full-time. This has long odds attached to it but can make for a nice return if you perm them together and place a small stake bet. With so much flexibility, it is easy to see why the market is still in existence, although disappointing that more people don’t turn to it when they need to place a bet on the upcoming football.
Backing Favourites HT/FT
In my opinion, the best way to use this market is to back a favourite to win at both half time and full time, enhancing the price. The bet is trickier to land of course, but if you are backing a team that is long odds on and you strongly fancy them to win by a few goals, then they really should be winning at half time if what you predicted is going to happen. I am not a fan of backing at very short prices so using the half time full-time market makes those selections available to me.
Backing a short priced favourite that is 1/3 to win the game would usually give you a price of around even money for the half time full-time bet. That is a big difference in price and although the bet requires another element to win for it to succeed, a lot of the time I believe this risk is worth taking for the enhanced price on offer.
By backing the team at even money, you will be able to either back a smaller amount of teams for the same return or perm them together meaning you don’t need them all to win for the bet to be successful.
Backing Draws HT/FT
Another use for the half time full-time market is to use it when you fancy a game to finish as a draw. I usually look at this when I see a match that on paper looks like it will be tight with few scoring opportunities. With this strategy, it is usually about finding a game that I feel has a good chance of not only being a draw but also being a 0-0 draw. Of course, if the game ends 0-0 then the bet will be a winner and the game will have been a draw at both half time and full time. The odds on this are enhanced and you have a good chance of getting a very good price about the games you think will end up as draws.
The normal draw price in 90 minutes is usually between 2/1 and 3/1. However, using the half time full-time market will enhance this price incredibly. The price on a draw at half time and a draw at full time will usually be anywhere between 4/1 and 6/, depending on the game in question. Using
something like a patent bet, you could place a bet on three different games to be a draw at both half time and full time. This costs you 7 x your stake, so if you placed a £1 patent it would cost you £7. However, just one winner will give you the majority of your stake back, and any more than one winner would give you a nice profit on the bet. If you happen to get three out of three then that would be a very nice return, without staking a huge amount of money. I like to look for opportunities like this towards the end of a season when many clubs play each other in games that do not mean too much. These games can often fizzle out into boring, dull 0-0 draws.
Backing HT/FT Long Shots
The last way to use this market is for a bet that is a small stake, throw away bet just for interest. I don’t recommend this for serious punting, just for fun in the hope of a large return and nothing else.
Using this method you pair together large priced outcomes in the market, hoping that you can get two together, landing what would be a very nice bet. This is only to small stakes, it is a fun bet, but the chance is there to win big. I tend to do this bet when I am watching games on TV over a day or a weekend, but I do not really fancy anything, I am just betting for interest more than anything else. In this bet what we are hoping happens is that one team is winning at half time, but in the second half, the result changes and the opposing team come back to win the game. By perming the chances together you can cover both ways of this bet working, so it doesn’t matter which team are the ones to lead at half time, and which are the ones to finish as the winners.
The example below shows how I would place this bet.
Match 1
Team A winning HT – Team B winning FT
Team B winning HT – Team A winning FT
Match 2
Team A winning HT – Team B winning FT
Team B winning HT – Team A winning FT
Match 2
Team A winning HT – Team B winning FT
Team B winning HT – Team A winning FT
Permed doubles, eight bets so costs 8 times your stake.
This bet covers a total of six different outcomes, two in each game and to have a return on the bet you need two out of three games to go your way. The chances of this happening are slim, but with huge odds available of between 25/1 and 50/1, if you do manage to land the bet then you are in for a great pay out. The bet costs eight times your stake, and as I said it is only a small stakes bet this one, I usually do it for 20p, meaning the total bet costs £1.60. If you do manage to get one of these to land then the returns for a £1.60 bet would be between £150 and £200 depending on the prices. If you happen to have a winning bet in all three games then your returns would shoot up to somewhere between £450 and £600, a huge return for so little investment.
In Conclusion
The half time full-time market is one of the oldest betting markets out there and has been used for a number of years. It seems to be dying away as more and more popular markets are available but hopefully, it does stick around as I believe it offers punters some great opportunities.
The most serious way to use this market is to back a favourite to be winning at both half time and full time. This enhances the odds on your selection and assuming you fancy them to win strongly you would hope they are winning at half time anyway.
Elsewhere, this is also a good market to exploit when backing draws, especially towards the end of the season when teams have nothing to play for. Perming together a few games and backing them to be a draw at half time and full time is a very good bet to place towards the end of the season and one that I regularly do myself.
The final way is a bit of fun, perm together some long shots on games that are live on TV to give you a big of interest. The chances of this bet winning are pretty slim, but if you manage to land one then you are in for a huge pay day.
If you have never used this market before, take a look next time you place your bets, you may be surprised. It offers competitive odds and a different way to back the selections you fancy.