It doesn’t matter what field of betting that you may be interested in, Free Bets are available now and are here to stay. Why? Online Sports Betting Bookmakers in particular need a way of encouraging new customers to register with them. Like many other businesses, a free gift, voucher or welcome bonus that carries a money value is a perfectly legitimate and fair way of getting new customers on board and in their database!

In the betting world it’s the same. A bookmaker will offer their free bet to newly registered punters when they create their online account. It’s very similar to the way a bank gives you a 20 pounds shopping voucher when you open a savings account with them. The voucher has a real value and is something you can use.

Free Bets carry a real cash value. If you register with a bookmaker and they offer you 25 pound in free bets then you can deposit as much as you wish between 10 and 25 and receive a match of your deposit from them to a maximum of the free bet value offer.

Therefore, if you’ve deposited 10, you’ll receive the same to bring your available betting fund to 20 GBP. This ten pounds from the bookmaker is your Free Bet and you can deposit up to the free bets offer value (in this case 25 quid) but if you deposit over this amount, you won’t receive any further match.

There are a few types of free bets, with some bookmakers giving a smaller free bet but over a few weeks, each week you receive a certain free bet value after you’ve placed bets from using the previous weeks free bet. This is useful to punters who may be weekly paid and can’t stump up the full amount they want at the beginning of a month.

Some bookmakers have other provisos that you can receive a certain free bet and use that within a certain time period, then claim another and so on or if you use the free bet and then place a certain number of consecutive bets to qualify for another.

A mistake a lot of people make is to think that free bets are just for sports betting. This is absolutely not true and indeed couldn’t be further from the truth. Outside Sports Betting is what is termed “Events Betting” which embraces almost anything you could think of that isn’t sports!

Examples of these areas are Financials, Weather, Music Betting, Next Prime Minister, next England Football Manager and so on. The list really is endless. Bookmakers offer odds on all these types of events but more importantly offer free bets to new customers who want to bet on them. Remember that a free bet is something that is used to add funds to your account, not to encourage you to bet on anything in particular.

If you want to bet on the Eurovision Song Contest, then create your account in the usual way, qualify and receive the welcoming free bet and you are free to bet on anything the bookie offers odds on, in this example - Eurovision.

So get looking around for free bets offers from most of the bookmakers to add to your betting budget. It really is an easy way to double your fund before you’ve done anything. There have been free bets offered as high as 250 pounds.

Shaun Parker has been involved with free bets for several years now. For more information visit Free Betting Online

I’ve never been in a bookies office, but the idea of spread betting in the comfort of my own home offers significantly greater appeal, and there are a number of websites I can look to find ideas. Spread betting offers a more interesting bet on the difference between two teams’ scores, or the likely total outcome of goals, points or scores in a sporting event, than traditional sports betting.

With the proliferation of online bookmakers, and peer-to-peer or exchange betting sites, you can also make a bet online, potentially against real bettors, rather than bookmakers. But to begin with, it might be more straightforward to get to grips with the basics of spread betting, and find out what you can potentially win (or lose)!

The bookmaker’s interest in spread betting is to encourage people to make a wider range of bets. In the US, this is usually applied to the difference in scores between two football or baseball teams. In the UK, it tends to be applied to the total amount of goals or corners during a football match.

In spread betting, a bettor bets on a difference score (an index), rather than a win outcome. For example in a game between Aston Villa and Chelsea, a bookmaker might offer a spread of between two and three as the total number of goals scored (this could be a decimal figure). As a bettor, you could choose to ‘buy’ when you believe the total number of goals will be greater than three, or ’sell’ where you believe the outcome will be less than two (the lower end of the bookie’s range).

The amount you stake will normally have a maximum limit. If you believe, contrary to the bookmaker, that this will be a high-scoring game, then you will ‘buy’ for a score above an upper limit.

Say your stake was 10 quid, then for a 3-2 outcome (a total of 5 goals) then you would receive 10 GBP (your original stake) for every point or goal above the upper limit of three, which would mean 2 X 10 = 20 pounds. If the outcome was 1-0 to Chelsea, you’d lose by threepoints (3 x 10=30 pounds). Obviously, you’d need to have enough in your account to cover the worst-case scenario.

The same could be applied to horse racing, where the spread would be the total number of points awarded to the bookie’s favourite, second favourite and third favourite horses. You could bet on a US football game, following the American style of betting on the difference between the two teams’ scores. Or if cricket is your preferred sport, you could choose to bet on the total number of runs made by an individual player either side of a certain range.

The history of spread betting
Before the invention of spread betting, people were likely to bet on a standard win or lose situation such as that favourite Chelsea would beat Aston Villa by an odds of three to one, or that underdog Colchester United would beat Arsenal depite the odds being 6 to 1.

Spread betting was invented by American Charles McNeil in the 1950s, a one-time maths teacher, and gambling afficionado who had opened his own bookmaking operation. He believed that he could determine not just who would win, but by how much, and being something of a whizz, he generally got it right.

Online spread betting
These days, you have a number of places to find out about or make your first spread bet. You can go directly to a high street bookmaker to open an account in the light of a future match. Or you could visit an online gaming site, where you may be able to benefit from introductory offers and read articles about how to find out more about spread betting.

Introductory offers could include cashback for a certain number of bets - have a look around to find the deals that suit you best and at odds that make sense to you. Peer-to-peer or exchange betting sites match potential betters with opposing views on the likely outcome of a sporting event, so that they bet directly against each other.

Perhaps the best thing about spread betting is that it offers a way for people to combine the old-fashioned skill of the football pools with the ease of modern technology.

Shaun Parker has been spread betting for several years now. To learn more about this for of gambling visit

There’s no question that online poker has opened up poker to so many people and given players who usually play offline the convenience of switching on their computer and sitting down at a (virtual) table any time they like. However, it’s vitally important that you give yourself plenty of time when playing poker.

An exception to this is possibly sit and go’s which generally take the same amount of time to finish, ie an hour or less, but in cash games and multi-table tournaments you really need to give yourself plenty of time.

Take multi-table tournaments for instance. These are real endurance events and can last seven hours or more so it’s no good entering one of these events if they start at say 9.00pm if you know you have to be up early the next day.

You have to go into these tournaments with the aim of winning it, so always make sure you can play through seven hours or more with no distractions. You also need to play with focus and discipline as these can be very tough events to win, and will require your full concentration from start to finish.

This often comes with experience, but try not to start to play more loosely after a few hours when your energy levels and motivation starts to drop, as this will generally lead to you going out of the tournament and you will have wasted your time and money.

It’s the same with cash games as well. To give yourself every chance of making consistent profits from the cash tables, you have to make sure you only play if you have plenty of time.

I personally learnt this the hard way early on in my poker career when I quickly discovered that if I only had say an hour or less to squeeze some poker in, then I nearly always left the session out of pocket.

This is because playing under time constraints doesn’t allow you to settle into a game, weigh up your opposition and get a feel for the table. It can completely change the way you play because the time constraint will force you to play a more loose and aggressive game which although can pay dividends in some cases, can also make a serious dent to your bankroll.

Since then, I’ve always made sure I have at least a few hours to sit at a cash table, as this is more than enough time to feel yourself into a game, and sit patiently for premium hands.

So to conclude, always allow yourself plenty of time when contemplating a session of poker, whether it’s an epic multi-table tournament or a simple cash game, as this will allow you to play your natural game without any self-imposed time constraints.

James Woolley is a regular poker player and the author of a poker blog which is a complete guide to internet poker, and contains the very latest holdem poker tips to help you become a better poker player.

Spread Betting is a relatively new innovation and differs from conventional fixed-odds betting. Punters can spread bet on sports events and financial markets. Bets are normally made on a final result or final score. In sports like cricket, football and rugby, spread betting falls into two main categories - namely, Total Number Bets, Supremacy and Match Bets. Winners are those who correctly predict the number of goals or points scored in a football or rugby match.

Total Number Bets
The key factor is the spread - that is, the difference between the prices at which a punter can back his selected team to do well and/or badly. Take the example of a cricket test match - India versus England. England to bat first.

The spread bet will be based on how many runs England score in their first innings. The spread, might be set at 320 - 380. This means England are expected to score between 320 and 380 runs. If a punter thinks that England could score a total of 430, he will Buy at the higher score quoted of 380.

If, on the other hand, a punter thinks England will score nearer 300 runs, he would Sell at the lower quote of 320 (Punters always Buy at the higher quote and Sell at the lower). Punters specify the amount per run they wish to bet. For example, if a punter thinks England will do well, he may Buy for 2 pound per run at 380. This means for every run over 380 that England score, the punter wins 2 pounds. So, if England make 450 runs, the punter’s total winnings will be 140 - (450-380) x 2 = 140 GBP.

But for every run below 320 that England total, the punter loses two pounds. If England are all out for 300, then his loss is 40 - (320-300) x 2 = 40 quid. If a punter decides England will do badly, he could Sell for 2 pound per run at 320. So for every run below 320 that England score, he would win 2 pounds.

A final England score of 250 would mean a profit to the punter of 140 - (320-250) x 2 = 140 quid. But for every run scored above 320, the punter loses 2, and if England’s total was 400 runs, the punter would lose 160 - (400-320) x 2 = 160 GBP.

In spread betting, winnings and losses are made in proportion to whatever unit stake is chosen. However, the unit stake is not the limit of a punter’s risk. A 10 pound bet with a bookmaker means that all a punter can lose is his tenner, whereas, a ten pound per run bet on a cricket match can mean a win, or loss, of many times the 10 pound unit stake.

Supremacy and Match Bets
In the case of supremacy and match bets, the focus is on how much a team will win by. A punter’s bet is based on the margin of victory of one team over another. A good supremacy example would be a rugby match between say, South Africa and France - the spread 18 - 24. This means that South Africa are fancied to beat France by between 18 and 24 points (the team on the left being the favourite).

If a punter believes South Africa will win by more than 24 points, he would Buy at 24 (the high end of the spread) for, say, 10 quid per point. And if South Africa win 50-20, a margin of 30 points, then the punter would win 60 pounds - (Margin of 30-24) x 10 = 60 GBP.

Shaun Parker is well known for information on Spread Betting gambling, and much more. For more information, gambling tips and tricks visit Free Betting Online

It is said that playing poker is truly addictive, once you get the hang of it. There is something in the game that holds you in thrall, mainly because you use strategies and observation to beat your opponents. Poker is especially fun if you have a natural habit of looking at other people, and reading their faces, whether they are bluffing or not. If you have this talent, then you are in for the win. With just the right deck of cards, the right strategies, a vast amount of luck. Of course, with the perfect poker face, you can almost be sure that you will be collect winnings in every game.

Playing poker usually happens in a gambling house or a casino. You go there, pick a table and start playing. One game can stretch for up to 5 hours or more. The intensity of the game can become quite alluring as you can become lost in the techniques and the bluffing this game requires. Watch your opponents, strategize with your cards and make sure that nothing is showing on your face.

But what if you have the choice of playing poker at home? Lets say play poker in the internet with the opponents and with the same decks. But then, you cannot see your opponents. Online poker is offered nowadays. This new technological development presents a way playing poker at home without the hassle of going out.

But before diving into online poker, it is nice to know the differences between the two. First of all, your strategies of reading other peoples faces to see if theyre bluffing are gone and virtually useless. So you have to rely on other things if you aim to win. You might try calculation of the cards to see if you can win. Bluffing will also put you at a disadvantage so you have to rely on playing a straight game to win. You also have to keep in mind that unlike the traditional poker, this game will definitely not stretch to about 5 hours. 10 minutes is enough for each game. You also do not have to play in just one table with online poker, instead you can join in multiple tables to assure yourself a win. You just have to keep in mind that your strategies in playing poker in a casino will be rendered useless when playing online.

Playing poker online of course greatly decreases the intensity of the game. Although playing online poses the attraction of you not leaving your house just to play, well, it has its disadvantages. Since strategizing is one main attraction in playing poker, it is still much more enjoyable if you play against real people, with real expressions and real strategies.

For real poker enthusiasts, it does not matter. If you really want to play poker, may it be in a casino or at home, you can dive in and win all these games.

Wallace Willis is the editor of SportsBetting1Stop.com, PlayOnlineGames2.com and FilmStarWallpaper.com that services thousands of people everyday. For details, visit Online Sports Betting Sites, Betting Forum, Free Online Games and Film Star Wallpapers.