Forums were the discussion hubs of the early internet. Over time, they faded in popularity as social media began to dominate the scene. While social media allows for plenty of free engagement with other users, it lacks the true community that can be built with a curated forum. Over time, users have been drifting back to forums for the conversation opportunities they present. With the return of forums and their increased popularity, football fans are using them for more reasons than ever before.

There are tons of football forums to choose from, depending on personal interests. International forums like the WettForum for the Bundesliga or Foot National for Ligue 1 can give insights into how fans of those teams are thinking about their seasons. Forums dedicated to specific aspects of the game or factors surrounding the game are common as well and can get very specific. The Shopping/Travel/Tickets Ultras forum is dedicated solely to buying and selling tickets or merch, and to discussing visiting stadiums and cities.

There are also tons of football forums devoted to betting on the sport. Sports betting is a massive industry and it’s growing all the time. Loyal punters bet on each and every match and on specific players’ actions. Casual bettors will place the occasional bet on big international tournaments, such as the Euros or the FIFA World Cup.

The big question is whether or not football forums can actually teach you to bet or if they’re just discussion spaces. In this article, we’ll look at some of the most important things to know about betting on football, and then take a look at the pros and cons of using football forums to learn how to bet.

Football betting

There are multiple ways to bet on football. The first is to simply follow your gut and always bet on your team. This isn’t necessarily the smartest strategy, but emotionally, it can be the most rewarding, since it’s adding an extra layer to being a supporter.

The other betting strategy is to carefully follow the matches, clubs and stats, and bet based on that information. This strategy is more likely to lead to successful bets but it is more time consuming and requires thorough research. It can also lead to placing bets on your club’s rivals to win, which could be painful.

One of the most important decisions when betting is what kind of bet to place. Single event bets are the basic, most common bet. It makes sense to place these bets when you don’t have enough detailed information about either club to place another type of bet. Single event bets can also be combined in accumulator bets, also known as parlays, when you feel confident about the outcome of a series of matches.

Spread bets and over/under bets are great bets to place when you’ve thoroughly researched the match. Both bet types involve the bookmaker setting not just the odds but an additional element. In the case of over/unders, the bookmaker sets the expected total number of goals scored (or an alternate statistic) and the bet is placed on whether the actual total will be over or under the bookmaker’s number.

These bets, as well as prop bets, can also keep things interesting as bettors become more familiar with betting. It prevents the hobby from getting stale, season after season.

Using forums for betting advice

Is it possible to learn how to bet from online football forums? This is a complicated question. For the absolute beginner, yes, it is possible to learn how to bet by getting advice on forums. Reading posts by successful bettors can give new bettors some insight into how to place smart bets, and the kinds of bets to avoid. It can also be a good way to compile data on bets placed by a large number of people.

One of the issues with using forums for betting advice is that you can’t actually know who you’re getting that advice from. Anyone can be anyone on the internet, which means that the supposed expert tipster handing out advice could be just as clueless as everyone else.

Final thoughts

Forums can’t teach you how to bet on a specific match or give you the secret code to becoming an expert bettor. Instead they are useful tools for researching betting strategies, for learning how to temper expectations and for getting new ideas about specific players and managers. They can help you become a better bettor – but you have to put in the actual hard work yourself.