What is Bore Draw Matched Betting?
Reading time – 6 minutes
The bore draw matched betting offer is available with football and run by bookmakers, most notably by bet 365 (and popular for a good reason).
Similarly to the 2up Early Payout offer, it’s an advanced strategy for matched betting, and it’s a type of ‘football refund IF offer’.
Don’t let the advanced tag put you off. It’s advanced because it’s plenty different from standard welcome offers (and in some way relies upon a specific outcome). This doesn’t mean it is challenging to run, nor does it represent a significant risk to the matched bettor.
Like other advanced strategies, though, we sacrifice higher qualifying losses to stand the chance of earning good profit. As with all techniques we look at, they are all profitable in the long run (if they were not, we wouldn’t be talking about them), so it is worth exploring.
What is a Bore Draw?
A bore draw is simply a game in which neither of the team scores and the game ends without goals (at 0-0).
So-called due to the often dull nature of a draw (including a ‘score-draw’) and especially 0-0 games with no goals scored. A bore draw is relatively unlikely to happen in football (something like 1 in every 13 football games in top leagues finishing goalless)*.
*bookmakers love to entice the public to run bets on unlikely events since, without matched betting (mug bets), they will always come off on top in the long run.
How do you Run the Bore Draw Matched Betting Offer?
To run this offer, you place the matched bets correctly (see below) and then hope for the specific outcome of a draw. If this happens, the bookmaker will give you back (refund) your stake as cash.
Find your opportunities on OddsMonkey or Profit Accumulator (or whichever matched betting site you are signed up to).
You simply back and lay a good market, and if the game finishes with a bore draw, you will receive your stake back as cash.
As with the Early Payout offer, there are tactics within the strategy, such as choosing to lock in a profit before or during the game (we will come to that!).
You can stay the course and hope the bore draw comes, which will bring the most reward. A decent profit comes your way when you receive a refund on your bet due to the promotion. Instead of facing a losing back bet and a winning lay bet, you have instead refunded your back bet and won at the betting exchange! This is the basis for great matched betting profit potential! It’s worth mentioning that it’s unlikely the offer will be limited in terms of bet stake!).
Bet 365 Key Terms and Conditions -
Bore Draw Matched Betting Offer*
- Offer only available to new and eligible customers;
- Eligible matches only, as listed on promotions page;
- Qualifying bet must be made pre-match on any eligible game for half time/full time, all ‘correct score’ and all ‘scorecast’ markets;
- If the game finishes 0-0, the stake is refunded (if the bet loses).
- Bets refunded in the same manner they were made (withdrawable balance/bet credits);
- It does not work in conjunction with a full cash-out.
*Always check the full terms and conditions before entering bookmaker promotions and placing bets.
When is the Bore Draw Matched Betting Promotion Available?
The bore draw is usually available on a good selection of football league matches (if included, then the betting slip will specify this) and competitions.
You must bet on the valid market (see terms above) to trigger the offer. For obvious reasons, this does not include betting on a bore-draw outcome (the bore draw only kicks in when your bet loses), and you then receive your refund!
You can lay your bets at any betting exchange, and we recommend Smarkets.
How do you Find Opportunities and Calculate the Bore Draw Matched Betting Offer?
To find the best-matched betting opportunities for the offer, we do the task similarly to other strategies.
Utilising your matched betting service odds matcher, you can identify relevant and closely matched trigger bets to ensure minimal qualifying losses.
Similarly to the 2up Early Payout offer, filter the best matches on the odds matcher for upcoming eligible games (at usual stakes and for high profile/normal leagues to avoid raising any red flags) and setup the odds matcher to email through any relevant opportunities (this can be very helpful).
For the first part of the offer, use the standard matched betting calculator. If we plan to hold out for the bore-draw to come good (see option A below), then that is the only step that needs to be taken.
Note: You will need the advanced ‘Refund IF’ (or ‘trigger bet’) calculator for the offer if you cash out rather than holding out for full profit/offer completion (as with options B and C below).
Bore Draw Matched Betting Example / Strategy Options
Let’s run through an example of the bore draw offer in action, detailing your options (at different points) with the strategy.
In this example, we have bet £100 at odds of 5.5 on Liverpool to beat Everton 2-0, and we lay 5.8 for a £5.18 qualifying loss. This loss is the outcome of the offer unless we get success from one of the three options below.
First steps with the offer:
- Find your opportunity on the odds matcher
- Enter your stake in the (standard) calculator.
- Input the correct back and lay odds on the calculator (with the lay commission).
- Place the back bet at the bookmaker and the lay bet at the exchange.
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As with the 2up Early-Payout strategy, there are several options to take to lock in a profit or to hold out for full completion of the offer.
With the bore draw, we hope for the 0-0 final score outcome, and with the 2up Early Payout, we hope for a full turnaround when a team comes back from 2 goals down and wins).
As with 2up, you can also lock in profit early during the game and with the bore draw offer you can also take a small (but guaranteed) profit before the match has even begun.
Back to our example…
The main strategy option is to hope that the match ends 0-0 result, our Option A.
Bore Draw Matched Betting Offer -
Option A: Hold on for the Match Ending 0-0
With this Option, once you have placed your back and lay bets with the odds matcher and calculator tools and at the bookmaker and exchange, you can leave it alone and hope the game ends 0-0.
If this comes to pass, then your profit will be the back stake amount you placed at the bookies (for the correct score bet) less the qualifying loss, so for example, our profit would be £94.82 (£100 – £5.18).
This strategy can win the most, but due to variance, we are often left with no profit and a marginal loss if a late goal comes (which most of the time it does).
Bore Draw Matched Betting Offer -
Option B: Lock-in Profit Pre-Match
Once you have placed your (qualifying) bore draw matched bets (back and lay), it’s possible to lock in profit pre-match (‘cash out’).
With this Option, we can make a guaranteed profit right away rather than hoping for the 0-0 (or exploiting the ongoing scoreless draw during the game – see option C).
You will need the lay odds for a 0-0 scoreline to do this, and it requires an extra bet. Use the more complicated matched betting calculator for this option, known as the ‘Refund IF’ or ‘Trigger Bet Calculator’.
To explain this more with our example, when we check on the betting exchange before the game starts, we might expect to find lay odds on Smarkets of 12.0 (against the 0-0 scoreline). We can potentially lock in about £3.15 (guaranteed) profit before the game starts.
Steps required:
Enter bet details
- Input your original back stake and back odds.
- Ensure the calculator Trigger Bet Lay Method is ‘set to normal’.
- Enter the free bet award (the same as your stake) and set the free bet retention percentage to 100% (as the refund is in cash).
Enter lay details
- Input your correct original lay odds on the calculator (with the lay commission) – your original lay stake and liability should match what you have already actioned at the exchange.
Enter Trigger lay details
- Ensure the calculator trigger bet lay method is set to ‘normal’.
- Input your lay odds (for the 0-0 match result) – for our example, this is 12.0.
- Input you lay commission.
- Lay the amount specified by the calculator; for this example, the amount it’s telling me is £8.33 on 0-0 (liability £91.63) and will result in this locked-in profit (though for this example this is low at only £3.15).
Our guaranteed profit from this Option comes from profit from the betting exchange if the game ends 0-0 (minus my slight qualifying loss). If the game does finish with a bore draw, then despite losing my liability, I would win a refund of my back bet stake refunded as cash.
Bore Draw Matched Betting Offer -
Option C: Lock-in Profit During the Match (at 0-0)
Option C is about locking in profit during the game; this is when the match is staying at a 0-0 scoreline. As the game progresses, the betting exchange odds will shorten lower and lower, so if the odds are more like 4.0, the lock-in profit can be as much as £19.82 (compare to above – Option B – £1.60).
You carry out the same steps as above with Option B but cash out the offer at a higher profit to carry out this strategy.
As the game progresses, you can decide whether to go with either Option A or C (you can even merge these strategies with a partial trigger bet lay, but this is a little complicated!).
Bore Draw Matched Betting Offer -
Final Thoughts
Which Option you should take with the bore draw matched betting strategy is up to you. For consistent small profit, options B and C are the best.
Each Option has different pros and cons. Option A is by far the simplest to deploy, but most of the time, a match will not finish 0-0. So most often, you will lose out due to variance and register a slight qualifying loss.
As with the 2up Early Payout offer, you have to look to the long term expected value and persistence is critical. When the bore draw comes, you take a win; and excellent profit awaits.
You may find yourself torn with the bore draw offer between options A and C regarding when to cash out the offer. As the game progresses (without goals and the odds of this changing shorten), you can input these changed odds into the Trigger Bet Calculator. The calculator will show you your guaranteed profit if you cash out at that point.
The more time passes in the game, with no goals, the shorter the lay odds will go and the more significant profit you can achieve. The risk increases, though, since any goal would result in you only logging your qualifying loss.
The choice is yours!
Profit Accumulator or OddsMonkey also offer an excellent choice of matched betting service. See our guide to the best matched betting sites if you want to compare every paid and free service that is currently on offer.
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Check out all of our tips and advice articles for more information, together with our beginner and advanced strategies posts sections. We also explain elsewhere what matched betting is, explain how it’s legal, and how through simple precautions matched betting should not go wrong.