Can flat betting on the goals under markets make a profit?

Today we explore another installment in our quest to uncover betting strategies that make money with little to no judgment on an individual game basis. With flat betting, we choose one league and one market, and bet on every single game with the same bet size.

Now it’s the turn of the goals under market. We already saw that the goals over market threw up a number of promising leagues for a flat betting approach, and suggested that the unders market would produce eve more profit.

So I was very excited to look at these markets in detail. It didn’t disappoint. We looked at every market between under 0.5 to under 4.5, and focused on which leagues produced more than 200 units of profit for the covered time period (first half of the 2024-25 season#0. To make sure we were not overly influenced by outliers, we oly looked at market/league combinations with more than 200 matches.

Under 0.5

This market essentially bets on 0-0 draws. Bore draws are pretty rare, and the strike rates below 10% reflect that. However, it’s interesting that it’s the leagues that are famed for lots of goals (German and Austrian top 2 divisions) show the most profit, which again demonstrates that oftentimes, high profitability is negatively correlated with high strike rates. Those who can cope with lots of pain stand to make the most profit.

Under 1.5

The 1.5 market is a promising one for unders bettors, and again, it’s interesting to see so many leagues which are famed as high-scoring affairs produce so much profit when taking the under. The effect of higher odds definitely plays a larger role than volume of successful bets.

Under 2.5

This is replicated in the 2.5…..

Under 3.5

…as well as the 3.5.

Under 4.5

This is typically the last unders market offered by bookies. Just one league produced a profit of over 100 units – England’s Premier League. This completes the somewhat surprising truth about the sunders markets. Many bettors mistakenly think that setting a high benchmark (in this case, 4.5) would lead to many leagues producing profits. Yet, it’s not the case.

This study is certainly eye-opening. When most bettors look for good leagues to apply over markets, they are looking for leagues that feature a lot of goals, with the inverse for under goals markets. And yet, the evidence presented above says they should be doing the opposite. It’s counter intuitive, but the best leagues for overs are low-scoring affairs, and for unders, it’s the leagues with a ton of goals.

Simon

Sports bettor with 20+ years experience. Focuses on football (soccer) as well as financial trading (crypto, FX and commodities).