Value Betting In Tennis: Tips For Finding Value Every Time

by Bob Stockton

@BobStockton10

The surest way to win big in any betting escapade is value betting.

When you find opportunities to bet for “value,” it’s more than likely that you will win big money.

However, finding this opportunity is not an easy thing to do, not least in a game like tennis.

Alas, that’s not to say it’s impossible. It is very much possible.

And I’m going to show you how very soon. But before I do that, I’ll like to first explain what the term “value betting” really means so that you can know what you’re looking for.

PRO TIP: Another game where value betting finds importance is poker pkv. If you like to bet on poker, you can check the Tomheroes site for value bets opportunities.

What is value betting?

Value betting is when you bet on games where the bookies’ odds are way below or way above the expected outcome of the event.

For example, let’s say a tennis match is coming up between Novak Djokovic and Roger Federer. You estimated that Djokovic had a 65% chance of beating Roger Federer (more on how to do this estimation later). Afterward, you converted the percentage to decimal odds, and you had an odd of 1.54 {(1 ÷ 65) x 100 = 1.54} for Djokovic winning the match.

After carefully scouring a couple of bookmakers’ websites, you saw a generous bookie who was offering a 1.82 odd for Djokovic’s win. Then you place your bet, and Djokovic wins as expected.

In this illustration, not only have you won your bet, but you’ve also won more money than you ought to. So, assuming you lost, you would have known you lost money betting on something that was offering value. The thought of that alone is enough to justify your decision to bet in the first place.

It’s important to note that, although you thought Djokovic was by far the most likely winner of that match, you would not have had the bet if the odds had not been significantly higher than the “true” odds of 1.54, and would have happily laid Djokovic had they been significantly shorter.

Simply put, “value betting” is when you see an opportunity to win the kind of money you wouldn’t have won on any other day!

Combining a Qualitative and Quantitative Approach to find value bets

There are several ways to find value bets, but the commonest ones are the qualitative and quantitative approaches.

In a qualitative approach, a punter assesses all the information they know about an upcoming event.

A typical example of someone taking a qualitative approach towards finding a value bet would be someone saying to themselves:

“Nadal has played Federer twelve times on clay and has won eleven times.  However, the last time they played on clay, Murray beat him.  Also, Nadal has been less consistent of late, whereas Murray has seemed to get better, especially on the red court.  Nadal is the better player on top form and has been more impressive in his last two tournaments on the way back from an injury.  I believe Nadal has a 60% chance of winning… 1 ÷ 60 x 100 is 1.66…”

A quantitative approach is where you try to assign numbers to past performances and create percentage chances for future events. 

For many people betting on tennis, this means creating and maintaining ratings for every tennis player – a number that represents their ability at any point in time. The professional tennis bodies do this for us in their rankings. Still, unfortunately, their methods are not statistically rigorous when it comes to using them to predict the outcome of future matches.

Thankfully, a few kind souls on the web offer their own ratings for general use, such as at tenniseloranking.

Let’s say Djokovic is going to play Murray at the Australian Open. And on the site – at the time of estimation – their ratings are 1777 and 1590 respectively. To convert these ratings into a percentage chance of either player winning, you divide their rating by the total of both ratings and then multiply the answer by 100.  So, for Wawrinka, {1777 ÷ (1777 + 1590)} x 100 = 52.7%.

You convert this to odds as outlined above to be given the “true” odds on Wawrinka of 1.90.

Having reviewed both the qualitative and quantitative information available, you can now compare your estimated odds with the “true” odds provided. If you see “value” in your comparison and you’re convinced – from a qualitative analysis perspective – that it’s truly a value bet, then you can proceed with making your bets.

Otherwise, you might refuse the bet altogether.