Understanding Parlay Betting

Parlay betting lets bettors familiar with money lines go one step further and double, triple etc. their excitement as well as their potential winnings.

Overview

Parlay betting is a variant of straight betting that brings more thrills and offers the chance for greater winnings. A parlay is a bet on at least two wagers in which you win only when all your selections win their games. Since in a parlay bet wagers are linked – if one wager loses you lose, regardless of what wagers do – the risks are far higher than in money lines. But so are the possible winnings.

Rules

• When one of the games on which you wagered ends in a draw, bookmakers declare it a no action (also know as a “push”). In this situation, unless otherwise mentioned, bookmakers consider for the payout only the remaining events you wagered on, disregarding the draw. This applies regardless of the number of events you bet on. (When you parlay on only two teams your bet becomes a normal win/loss bet.)
• Bookmakers don’t allow parlay bettors to bet on linked events. For example, you cannot wager on the outcome of the first half of a soccer match as well as on the final result of the match on the same ticket because both wagers are linked.

Example

To illustrate how parlay betting works here’s an example about three imagined Champions League matches. As a bettor, you use parlay betting to wager on a team in each match, in a connected bet, and have the chance to win considerably more than if you would bet individually, on separate tickets.

Home Team	Away Team	Home Win	Draw	Away Win	Result
Chelsea F.C	F.C. Barcelona	1.3	2.4	2.2	0-1
Manchester United	Juventus Torino	1.4	3.3	2.6	0-2
Inter Milano	Real Madrid	1.4	2.1	1.9	2-1

 

To win you should have chosen F.C. Bacelona to win its away game, Juventus Torino to win its away game, and Internazionale Milano to win its home game.

Assuming that you have indeed wagered on these teams $100 then you will win $100 x 2.2 x 2.6 x 1.4 = 800,8 – $100 (the amount you wagered).

On the other hand, if your bet was on F.C. Bacelona, Juventus Torino, and Real Madrid then you would have lost because though F.C Bacelona and Juventus Torino won Real Madrid was defeated.

Suppose that one of the games ended in a tie. In that case the bookmaker would have not taken it into account; whether or not you got payed would have depended entirely on the outcome of the remaining two matches. If one of those two matches also would have ended in a draw, then only the remaining one would count. If even this one would have concluded in a draw, then you should normally get a refund or the chance to play a new ticket.

Notes

Parlay betting is one of the most exciting forms of betting as well as one of the most rewarding. However, if you’re a new bettor you should stick with straight betting for a while, until you learn more about how the betting world works. With parlay betting you can lose a lot of money in a short time, and this can be discouraging when you’re new on the scene.