During my adventures here in London, I wanted to get a deeper understanding of the UK sports book scene and how it compares to the US-oriented books offshore. But to understand how UK bookies work, you have to understand the culture of sports in this country. Britain is one of the best sporting countries in the world. With passionate, knowledgeable fans and a wide variety of sports it’s hard to think of a better place to be a sports fan. The Brits invented most of the major sports played in the world today, like soccer, tennis, golf, cricket and rugby (which evolved into baseball and football), and a host of other sports and games like billiards, badminton, curling, boxing, darts, squash, ping-pong, bowling, water polo . . . They even have a TV game show called A Question of Sport where celebrity soccer players, racecar drivers, jockeys and other athletes quiz each other on sports trivia. But most striking is the popularity of horse racing, which is a huge spectator sport with a loyal fan base. Every Saturday the major TV networks set aside a few hours to show the races. Can you imagine CBS, NBC or FOX doing that? It would be suicidal for ratings. But in Britain only soccer is bigger than horse racing, so it’s entirely understandable.
With that backgrounder, we can now make sense of how bookmakers work in this country. I interviewed Tim Bishop of Skybet, a major online sports book, for his take on North American sports betting. For all UK bookmakers the most widely bet sport is horse racing, since there are dozens of races each day, seven days a week. But soccer is a close second, and as I mentioned last week there’s a vast number of markets available, and all kinds of props like which player will score first, or how many yellow cards will be shown. Next in turnover are greyhound racing and golf, both big money earners for UK books. North American sports don’t figure prominently, appearing as a tiny blip in most bookies overall operations. Football is the most popular and it rivals rugby in turnover levels. This is largely due to excellent TV coverage, with three or four live games per week airing in the evening (after soccer is over). But Bishop says bettors are less keen on the other sports, "Basketball, hockey and baseball combined would only account for about 10% of what we take on golf, and less than 0.1% on soccer." Bookies also find these sports less profitable because there are usually only two options to choose from (home win/away win or over/under), unlike horse racing, soccer and golf, which have many more.
But Bishop expects North American sports to become more popular in the future as TV coverage is rapidly increasing. A new satellite channel called NASN (North American Sports Network) just launched a few months ago and is proving extremely popular. When asked how he thinks UK books will treat American sports five years from now, Bishop thinks they’ll be a good source of extra revenue during the late night quiet periods. But the potential for growth is limited, largely because of time zone differences. Since most North American sports start at 7pm or later, Brits have to stay up well past midnight to watch them live. And those are just east coast games with a five-hour time difference. It’s hard to imagine large numbers of people staying awake for a west coast game that starts at 3am. With the exception of afternoon football, most North American sports will continue to be watched mainly by insomniacs.
For bettors in North America, however, UK sports books can offer several benefits. Most spreads are priced to a standard -110 and there is some real value available if you shop your lines. Because they take less action on football and basketball, UK books are also much slower in adjusting their numbers. Savvy bettors can take advantage. Several offer accounts in US and Canadian dollars. And for those who like to bet on golf and soccer, you’ll find the odds are really competitive.