04 Head-to-Head markets / Betfair Education / 19 March 2008 / Leave a comment

So in both cases in the illustrated example in the previous article, laying provides a better price. It doesn't always work that way, it's just that most Betfair customers stick to what they know - only betting on something to happen (backing) and only taking what they can see on the screen.

If a market is highly liquid and close to the start, any anomalies such as this will probably have been levelled out. A good guide is looking at the market % figures above the Back and Lay columns. The closer they are to 100%, the less likely you can make use of this.

However not all matches are shown on television, and not all sports and markets are as popular as others. These opportunities occur every day across a wide range of markets - they're not as obvious as over-broke markets (markets to back <100%) which also means less people pick them up. Can't work out how to profit from these markets? Imagine laying Precocious Leader at 1.9 (equates to backing Ardent Stayer at 2.11) and then asking to lay Ardent Stayer at 2.04. If you get matched, you've got a green book.