If there is a sport that is guaranteed to offer you plenty of betting opportunities throughout the year, then golf is as good a choice as any. The expansion of the major tours to include winter months stints in Florida and Southern hemisphere countries, added to the FEDEX Cup and Race to Dubai playoffs mean that golf is now essentially a year-round sport.
Of course, that means as a Bet365 customer (and if you aren’t one, click on the following link to grab the latest Bet365 bonus code to get signed up today), then you have a great choice of golf bets all year round.
Most popular bet365 golf bet is on who will win the latest tournament being contested, but when tournaments are in progress, there are a number of other golf bets available and these are considerable less well understood.
In this article, we are going to take a look at a trio of these bets and explain exactly how they work and what you are betting on to explore exactly why they offer a fantastic alternative to simply betting either on a player to win the tournament, or to finish in the paying places with an each way bet.
Golf betting doesn’t solely have to be about who wins the tournament, there are a huge number of bets available at Bet365 when a tournament gets underway, usually on a Thursday each week. So if you are wondering what is a six shooter golf bet, or what a 18-hole match up bet is about, then this is the article! Let’s get into the swing of things with a closer at one of these types of bets; the 3-ball bet.
Bet365 Golf Bets
3-Ball Betting
As you will likely be aware if you follow golf closely, in most tournaments players play the first two rounds of the tournament in groups of three, then after the cut, the players who made the cut then play in pairs for the final two rounds.
You would assume that 3-ball Bet365 golf betting would likely be a bet on which of the three players in the opening two-round threesome matches would be the best scoring player on each day.
However that is not always the case.
Sometimes, these bets can see golfers from different groups pitched against each other to provide a grouping where the ability levels are more evenly matched and thus the betting odds are more evenly spread across the three players.
At other times, it will be the three players playing together that are given odds and placed in a theoretical competition with each other to see who will win.
This can be on the opening two rounds, but also in the later rounds if a tournament has been delayed by weather, or sees groups of three players playing together, rather than groups of two.
In this bet, all you are betting on is which player out of the three named golfers posts the lowest score in that round out of that group.
If your player beats the other two golfers in that round in terms of net score, then your bet wins, regardless of where that player stands in the tournament.
In terms of betting, these markets can be quite volatile and even in groups where one player is judged to be significantly weaker than the other two players, on some rounds that seemingly lower ability player (usually with longer odds) will end up scoring lowest out of the three golfers.
There are equivalent bets available on tournaments where the final round sees groups of two players, when you can bet on which player out of the pair will score the lowest.
However, this is not the only golf bet at bet365 Sport which can pitch two players against each other over a round.
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18-Hole Match Ups
In 18-hole matchup betting, two players in the field (often starting at different tee times and in different playing groups) are pitted against each other in a theoretical match up and given odds on who will score the lowest round out of the two players on that day.
Usually, when Bet365 does this, it will try to pit golfers of a similar ability together to ensure that the odds on offer are around the even money mark or thereabouts.
Punters can then bet on which of the two golfers will perform the best in the stated round over the 18 holes.
If you back your golfer and they shoot the lowest score between themselves and the golfer listed as pitted against them by the sports betting company, then your bet wins.
Although no handicap is involved, these bets do share a lot of similarities with Handicap bets where two teams are given a positive or minus handicap to try and offer odds around even money on each option.
In golf, no handicap is required because the sports book can put together golfers of a very similar ability level from the field.
Six Shooter Golf Bet
In this bet, the sports book doesn’t select a group of two golfers, but instead a group of six, hence the six shooter golf bet (sometimes called the 6 shooter golf bet).
In truth, there can be any number of golfers included in these bets, depending on the size of the tournament, but six seems to be a popular number to give the sportsbook enough of a differentiation between the golfers to make some appetising offers in terms of the odds available.
Groups are decided by grouping golfers of a similar ability, albeit they may be playing in different groups and at different times for the stated round.
From the golfers that are grouped together, you can bet on which one of the six players will score the lowest out of the group in the stated round.
It is worth noting that this bet is based on the golfers’ performance in this round only. Their overall standing in the tournament is not important.
If a player scores lowest in the group with a score of 4 under, then they would be the winner of this bet, even if they finished in a lower position in the tournament than any of the other golfers.
The 6 shooter golf bet tends to offer a greater variety of odds for punters than either of the two other multiple competitor bets outlined above and means that there is a bigger chance of a greater return on your bet.
Especially if you are going to be backing one of the outside options from the group.
Your selection is only competing against other players in their group, they don’t need to beat any other players score, simply the score of the five other players listed as competing against them in the group of golfers.
This is a very good bet if you enjoy a greater variety of odds to choose from and with golf being a generally volatile sport, you can often find longer odds selections being the ones that pay out at the end of the round.
Other Golf Bets
Alongside these bets listed above, you can often find a number of bets available pre-tournament that offer you more options than simply betting on the To Win Outright market.
Some of the most interesting options in this category are as follows:
- Top Finishes – This is a bet on a golfer in the field finishing in the top 5 or top 10 of the tournament.
- To Make Cut – A simple yes/no bet on whether the stated golfer will make the cut at the tournament.
- Top Golfer By Category – In this bet, you can split the field into separate categories of players (Nationalities are very popular grouping choices) and you can then bet on a selection from each category to be the best performing player in the tournament from that group. So for example, you can back any of the English players in a tournament to beat the other English players in the event.
- Winning Margin – This is a bet on how the winner of the tournament will win the event and what their margin of victory will be from a selection of different options.
- 72-Hole Match Ups – This is a bet which selects two golfers from the tournament and pits them against each other. You can bet on one of the golfers from the two to score lower than their opponent in the tournament, for their opponent to score lower or for both of them to score the same.
- 72-Hole Group Betting – This is a very similar bet to above, but instead of just two golfers, a group of golfers is selected usually of similar ability and usually of around 4-6 players. You can then bet on which one player in that group will score the lowest in the tournament.
- Hole In One – A bet on whether there will be a hole in one in the tournament.
Golf Futures Betting
Another betting market for golf fans to enjoy is the Futures betting market and in terms of golf, that tends to mean betting on the outright winner of the next four Major championships of the year (the US Masters, The US Open, The British Open and the USPGA Championship) plus other events such as the FEDEX Cup or Road To Dubai Winner, the Ryder Cup/President’s Cup or Solheim Cup winner and which players will top the money lists.
There is also betting available on who will top the LPGA Money List as well as those in the male events.
With a plethora of bets available on golf across the year, and the sites famous Bet365 Live Golf Tracker now available across a wide selection of tournaments on the PGA and European tours, it is easy to see why punters love Bet365’s excellent and comprehensive betting service for golf.
