Betting on golf always presents a wealth of different obstacles to the punter, not least because a golfer’s worst enemy is themselves. Things can be going as smoothly as you like, only for one bad shot to send the player into a spiral of self-doubt and questioning that sees their lead at the top slip away like sand through your fingers. As a result, some people choose not to bet on the outright winner of a tournament, but look for other wagers that can still offer some value. One such bet is the winning margin, asking how many shots you think will be between the player that wins the competition and the player or players in second.
What You’re Betting On
If you want to place a bet on the winning margin market then the most important thing that you can do is to is to make sure that you know what it is that you’re betting on. The winning margin wager is one regarding the number of strokes between the winner of the competition and the player who comes second. Sometimes, of course, there might be more than one player tied for second, in which case it is the number of shots between the winner and the players in second, but it is still the same bet. Most bookmakers will offer you a choice of several options, meaning that your bet will definitely be settled one way or the other.
It might be that the choices available to you are something like the example above with the following:
- 1 Stroke – 5/2
- 2 Strokes – 4/1
- 3 Strokes – 11/2
- 4 Strokes or More – 3/1
- Win by Playoff – 3/1
Those are just some example odds, explaining how bookmakers tend to view the likelihood of each thing happening. Obviously a bet on a player winning by 4 strokes or more will mean that a player enjoying victory by 3 shots or fewer will see your wager be a losing one. That is the sort of thing that you need to bear in mind before you look to place your bet.
Player Betting
Most bookmakers will offer a winning margin market that doesn’t require you to decide which player will win the competition. This means that you can simply decide how many shots you think there will be between the winner and the player or players coming in second without having to also work out the overall winner over the tournament. Of course, because the bet lacks the complication associated with also deciding upon the overall victor, you will usually find that the odds on this market aren’t all that long. The winning player will definitely either win by playoff or else win by a margin of 1, 2, 3, 4 or more shots, after all.
As a result, some bookies will offer you winning margin odds for specific players. This sort of bet not only requires the player that you’ve bet on to win the tournament, but also for them to do so by a specific winning margin that you’ve bet on them to win by. A player that stands some chance of winning but isn’t considered to be one of the favourites, for example, might have odds like the following:
- 1 Stroke – 20/1
- 2 Strokes – 30/1
- 3 Strokes – 50/1
- 4 Strokes or More – 90/1
- Win by Playoff – 90/1
This bet is really only worth placing if you are convinced that a specific player is going to win the tournament in question but you want to find something to lengthen the odds on them doing so. It is the equivalent of adding several markets to a bet builder, given that you need all of the things in question to happen in order for your wager to be a winning one. If they player wins but doesn’t have the margin that you bet on, you will lose your stake. If they finish the correctly guessed number of shots in front of the next player but didn’t actually win the tournament, you will lose your bet. It is a wager with a fair amount of difficulty behind it.