Market formats and exact settlement rules
A price only means something next to the rule that settles it. Learn how the seven Value 7 market families settle in general football markets, and where Value 7's simplified win-or-lose rules change the maths.
Learning objectives
- State the win, lose and (in general markets) push conditions for match result, BTTS, totals, Asian handicap, team totals and goalscorer picks.
- Split a quarter-line Asian handicap into its two half-stakes and settle it for any final score.
- Compute fair odds for a whole line under push-refund rules and under Value 7's no-push rule from the same score grid.
- Explain why a cash-out offer is a price with its own margin rather than a free option.
The rule is part of the price
A decimal price tells you what a winning stake returns. It says nothing about what counts as winning. Two quotes of 2.00 on “Harbour City −1” can be different products if one refunds the stake when Harbour City win by exactly one goal and the other treats that result as a loss. Before comparing any price with any probability, write down the settlement event: the exact set of final scores or match events that makes the pick win, lose, push or void.
Almost every football market settles on regular time: 90 minutes plus stoppage time. Extra time and penalty shoot-outs are excluded unless the market explicitly covers them, as “to qualify” or “to lift the trophy” markets do. Value 7 settles every family on regular time.
| Market | Wins when | General convention | Value 7 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Match result (1X2) | The chosen outcome stands after regular time | Three-way, no push | Same |
| Both teams to score | Yes: both teams score at least once; No: at least one does not | Own goals count for the team credited | Same |
| Total goals | Total is above (Over) or below (Under) the line | Whole lines push when exact; quarter lines split the stake | Exactly on a whole line loses both ways |
| Asian handicap | Goal difference plus handicap is above zero | Zero is a push; quarter lines split the stake | Adjusted zero loses; no half-wins |
| Home / away team total | That team's goals are over or under the line | As totals, counting one team's credited goals | Exactly on the line loses both ways |
| Goalscorer (anytime) | The player is credited with a regular-time goal | Own goals do not count; many bookmakers void a player who takes no part | A player who does not play loses |
Half, whole and quarter lines
A half line (2.5 goals, −1.5 handicap) cannot land exactly, so every result is a clean win or loss. A whole line (2 goals, −1 handicap) can land exactly; in general markets that result is a push and the stake comes back. A quarter line (−0.75, 2.25) splits the stake into two halves, one on each neighbouring line.
−0.75 = ½ stake on −0.5 + ½ stake on −1Fair odds with a push refund: o = 1 + P(lose) / P(win)Fair odds with no push (Value 7): o = 1 / P(win)The Value 7 consequence is precise. On a whole Asian handicap line an adjusted result of zero loses for both sides, so Harbour City −1 wins only on a margin of two or more (exactly the scores that win −1.5), and Northvale +1 wins only on a draw or a Northvale win (exactly the scores that win +0.5). On totals, Over 2 wins only on three or more goals and Under 2 only on zero or one. A whole Value 7 line is never easier than the neighbouring half line.
BTTS, team totals and goalscorers
Both teams to score depends on both attacks and both defences, not on who wins: a 2-1 defeat still lands Yes. Own goals count for the team credited with the goal, so a Northvale defender's own goal counts as a Harbour City goal for BTTS. Team totals work the same way: only goals credited to that team count, own goals included.
Goalscorer markets settle on the player's own credited goals; own goals never count for the player who put the ball in his own net, and disallowed goals never count. The general convention for a player who takes no part varies: many bookmakers void anytime-scorer bets on non-participants and return the stake, while rules for substitutes and first-scorer markets differ between operators. Read the house rules. In Value 7, a goalscorer who does not play simply loses.
P(win, Value 7 scorer) = P(plays) × P(scores | plays)With hypothetical numbers: a striker with an 80% chance of playing who scores in 35% of appearances wins a Value 7 pick 0.80 × 0.35 = 28% of the time, a fair price of 3.571. At a bookmaker that voids non-runners, the same player's fair price is 1/0.35 = 2.857. Same player, same match, different product.
Regular time, extra time and cash-out
Suppose Ferrybank and Redcastle draw 1-1 after 90 minutes of a cup tie and Ferrybank win on penalties. A match-result pick on the draw wins; a pick on Ferrybank loses; a general-market “Ferrybank to qualify” bet wins. The shoot-out decides who goes through but does not change the regular-time score.
A cash-out offer is the bookmaker offering to buy your bet back before settlement. It is just another price from the same counterparty, normally with a margin inside it. The fair value of a ticket is its potential return multiplied by the current fair probability that it wins. A 10-unit bet at 2.30 has a potential return of 23.00; if the fair chance of winning is now 70%, the ticket is worth 23.00 × 0.70 = 16.10. A cash-out offer of 15.00 is 6.83% below that fair value.
Worked example
Worked example · One score grid, settled under two rule sets
Hypothetical match: Harbour City v Northvale. Assume independent Poisson goals with expected goals λ = 1.6 for Harbour City and μ = 1.0 for Northvale on a 0–10 grid (mass outside the grid ≈ 0.0001%). These probabilities illustrate settlement rules; they are not a forecast of any real match.
- Read the grid
Score grid: home 51.34%, draw 25.00%, away 23.66%. Split the home wins by margin with the −1 handicap on the score grid.Margin ≥ 2: 27.05%; margin exactly 1: 24.29%; margin ≤ 0: 48.66% - Harbour City −1, general rules
Win 27.05%, push 24.29%, lose 48.66%. Fair odds = 1 + 0.4866 / 0.2705≈ 2.799 - Harbour City −1, Value 7 rules
A one-goal win now loses: P(win) = 27.05%, P(lose) = 72.95%. Fair odds = 1 / 0.2705≈ 3.697 (identical to −1.5) - Quarter line −0.75, general rules
Full win 27.05%, half-win 24.29%, lose 48.66%. Solve 0.2705(o − 1) + 0.5 × 0.2429(o − 1) = 0.4866Fair odds ≈ 2.241 - Over 2 goals
P(over 2.5) = 48.16%; P(exactly 2) = 73.26% − 48.16% = 25.10%; P(0–1 goals) = 26.74%. General: 1 + 0.2674 / 0.4816. Value 7: 1 / 0.4816General fair ≈ 1.555; Value 7 fair ≈ 2.077 - Same quote, two rule sets
Hypothetical quote 2.60 on Harbour City −1. General EV = 0.2705 × 1.60 − 0.4866. Value 7 EV = 0.2705 × 2.60 − 1General ≈ −5.4%; Value 7 ≈ −29.7%
The score grid never changed; only the settlement rule did. Under push-refund rules a fair −1 price is about 2.80; under Value 7's win-or-lose rule it is about 3.70, the same as −1.5. Attach the rule to the price before computing anything, and never import a fair price from a market with different settlement.
Practice · Price a Value 7 whole line
Open the Fair Odds and Expected Value lab. A hypothetical Value 7 quote of 3.40 is offered on Harbour City −1. Use the grid probability of 27.05% (a two-goal margin or more) with a plausible range of 25%–29%. Read the break-even probability, the EV at the estimate and the verdict. Then work out by hand what the same 3.40 would be worth if one-goal wins were refunded.
Lab 1 · Fair odds and expected value
Synthetic · deterministicNegative across your range. Even the high end of your range is below break-even. There is no advantage under any probability you consider plausible: no action.
Show data table
| True probability (%) | Expected ROI |
|---|---|
| 15% | -49% |
| 16% | -46% |
| 17% | -42% |
| 18% | -39% |
| 19% | -35% |
| 20% | -32% |
| 21% | -29% |
| 22% | -25% |
| 23% | -22% |
| 24% | -18% |
| 25% | -15% |
| 26% | -12% |
| 27% | -8% |
| 28% | -5% |
| 29% | -1% |
| 30% | 2% |
| 31% | 5% |
| 32% | 9% |
| 33% | 12% |
| 34% | 16% |
| 35% | 19% |
| 36% | 22% |
| 37% | 26% |
| 38% | 29% |
| 39% | 33% |
Educational calculator. Uses only the numbers you enter or seeded synthetic data — no live prices, no staking, no real money.
Show what you should find
Break-even is 1/3.40 = 29.41%, above the whole range. EV is about −8.0% at 27.05%, −15.0% at 25% and −1.4% at 29%: negative across the range, so the honest conclusion is no action. Under push-refund rules the same 3.40 would give EV = 0.2705 × 2.40 − 0.4866 ≈ +16.3%. A general market would not sit that far from its fair price of about 2.80; the point is that the rule, not the football, flips the sign.
Common mistakes
- ✗ Treating −1 and −1.5 as different bets in Value 7.In Value 7 an exact one-goal win loses at −1, so −1 and −1.5 win on exactly the same scores. Compare their prices directly; take whichever is longer.
- ✗ Assuming a goalscorer who does not play is void.That is a common bookmaker convention, not a universal rule, and in Value 7 the pick loses. Price P(plays) × P(scores | plays), not just P(scores | plays).
- ✗ Counting extra-time goals or penalties.Match result, totals, handicaps, BTTS, team totals and goalscorer markets settle on regular time (90 minutes plus stoppage) unless a market says otherwise. Value 7 always uses regular time.
- ✗ Treating cash-out as free insurance.A cash-out offer is a buy-back price with a margin. Compare it with potential return × current fair probability before accepting.
When it fails
Supporting research
- Maher (1982): Modelling association football scoresStatistica Neerlandica · Peer-reviewed empiricalTeam-strength Poisson models describe football scores reasonably well, which is why a score grid is a sensible tool for turning one set of goal expectations into settlement probabilities for many markets at once.
- Dixon & Coles (1997): Modelling Association Football Scores and Inefficiencies in the Football Betting MarketJournal of the Royal Statistical Society: Series C (Applied Statistics) · Peer-reviewed empiricalAdds a correction for low scores (0-0, 1-0, 0-1, 1-1). We set it to zero here for simplicity; it matters most for exactly the draw and one-goal-margin outcomes that decide whole-line settlement.
Check your understanding
Practice only: saved on this device, no XP and no account record.