What is Double Chance in betting?

In essence Double Chance is an option for the bettor to bet on two outcomes of the game, ultimately eliminating the third option i.e. the bet allows you to bet on either the home team and the draw or the away team and the draw.

A Pinnacle Sports +0.5 handicap works perfectly as Double Chance, but what happens when Pinnacle Sports are not offering 0 and 0.5 handicaps. In a game you want to bet on?

How to calculate Double Chance odds

We have established by betting on Double Chance, there are two out of three possible outcomes that will ensure your bet is successful. Consequently, odds are significantly lower than the straight 1X2 odds.

Lets use an example to explain clearly.

You want to bet on Chelsea to beat Tottenham at odds of 1.971, but you believe Tottenham may upset the odds and secure a draw, but Pinnacle Sports doesn’t offer Tottenham at 0.5 on the handicap, which would enable you to cover that option. Other bookmakers offer Tottenham to win or draw at 1.25, is that better value than at Pinnacle Sports?

Odds for the draw are at 3.880, and you are willing to risk £100, for this bet. Bettors should bet part of their £100 stake on Chelsea to win, and the remaining stake on the Draw. Obviously, only one of these bets will win but we want the same profit in either case.

For the purpose of this example we will label the stake on Chelsea as S. The stake on the Draw is therefore (£100-S). If Chelsea win, the bettor will win 0.971* S from that bet (The 0.971 comes from 1.971-1); the profit is calculated as Stake*(Decimal Odds – 1), and the bettor loses stake on Draw, which was (100-S); so, our total profit is 0.971*S – (100-S).

If the game ended in a draw, the calculation for the draw would see the bettor win 2.88 * (100-S) from the bet on the Draw. Therefore net profit would equal 2.88* (100-S) –S. As stated earlier bettors will want both profits equal, hence:

0.971*S – (100-S) = 2.88*(100-S) – S

This simple equation works out the Value of S as £66.31. This means we should stake £66.31 on the Chelsea win and £33.69 (which works out as 100-66.31) on the draw.

So if Chelsea win the bettor will earn (1.971-1)*66.31 = £64.39, and lose £33.69 on the draw, with a net profit of £30.70.

If the game is drawn the bettor would win (3.88-1)*33.69 = £97.03, and lose £66.31 on the Chelsea win bet, with an overall net profit of £30.72 – as close as it can be, due to rounding.

Therefore if you opted for a Double Chance bet with another bookmaker, you would have come away at least £5 worse off, which is 16% of your profit.

Pinnacle Sports	Chelsea to Win	Draw
Stake	£66.31	£33.69
Odds	1.971	3.88
Profit	£30.70	£30.72

Other Bookmaker	Chelsea to Win or Draw
Stake	£100
Odds	1.25
Profit	£25

How to calculate Double Chance stakes

From the above example, you can derive a general rule for calculating stakes. If we label the total amount of money bettors want to risk with TOTAL, odds for Home Win with HOME and odds for Draw with DRAW, then:

Stake on Home Win = DRAW * TOTAL / (DRAW + HOME)
Stake on Draw = TOTAL – Stake on Home Win

If you want to just compare odds, to get effective decimal odds, you need to divide the return with the stake.

For the example above, the £100 staked returns £130.70 (profit is £30.70), therefore the decimal odds are 130.7/100 = 1.307.

The formula to calculate effective odds can also be worked out from the equations above:

Return from Home win bet is:

HOME * DRAW * TOTAL / (DRAW + HOME)

Therefore after dividing your return with TOTAL, the odds appear to be:

Effective Odds = DRAW * HOME / (DRAW + HOME)

The equations for the other two Double Chance markets (Draw or Away win and Home win or away win), where AWAY stands for Away Win odds, are as follows:

Draw or Away Win:

• Stake on Away Win = DRAW * TOTAL / (DRAW + AWAY)
• Stake on Draw = TOTAL – Stake on Away Win
• Effective Odds = DRAW * AWAY / (DRAW + AWAY)

For Home Win or Away Win:

• Stake on Home Win = AWAY * TOTAL / (AWAY + HOME)
• Stake on Away Win = TOTAL – Stake on Home Win
• Effective Odds = HOME * AWAY / (HOME + AWAY)

Bettors should arm themselves with as much ammunition needed to seek out the best value for their bets. By understanding how to calculate Double chance stakes and odds on the 1X2 market will allow them to work out were the best value lies and give them an alternative to betting Double Chance with other bookmakers or an Exchange; we are confident you will pick Pinnacle Sports.

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Source: pinnacle.com