Have you ever wondered about the odds? How bookies sets them at a certain level, who is responsible for doing that? And finally, how the bookmakers decide who is the favorite in a given game?!

Let's think about it. Bookmaker is a company, that have to bring profit. They earnings are based on a commission that they earn when the odds does not sum to 100%. But to make profit, bookmaker have to earn the commission, no matter what a result of the game was. Bookies are simply not interested who is the favorite in a given game, they only want to know what is supply and demand from players on 1 X 2. Odds-makers don't determine who is the better team, they determine what odds will be the best to have maximum profits from commissions! Let's say that you see odds like this:

1.5 - 4 - 6

Now, if you look on the odds like most of the players, you will say: the first team have the probability of winning of 50%, the draw will happen with around 30% probability, and the second team will win with a 20% probability. But this don't mean that!! This odds mean that odds-makers after analyzing similar games said, that for the first team people will bet twice as much money as on the other results.

Of course in most cases the probability and the supply and demand is very similar. But there are also many cases in which odds and probability is different. In next article during the next weekend I will write how to use it, and how the professional services that sell picks for thousands of dollars make use of it!