The markets, explained
SoccerGhost prices the bets a bookmaker lists for a football match. For each one this page says what it means, how SoccerGhost settles it, how the Ghost works out its chance, and how the Ghost's numbers in that market have actually come in. Every percentage on the site is the Ghost's probability: the chance it gives the bet, worked out from football and never from a bookmaker's price. A probability is not a promise. A 70% call misses about three times in ten, and it should.
How every market settles here
- On the 90-minute score. Normal time and stoppage time count; extra time and penalties never do. A cup tie level at 1–1 after ninety minutes and won 2–1 in extra time settles as 1–1.
- Void, not lost, when the match is not played. A match not played to a finish within 48 hours of the kick-off a call was made for, or moved by more than that, voids the call: it is neither a win nor a loss, and it leaves every figure.
- No refunds on a line. Every goal line and handicap SoccerGhost prices is a half line (0.5, 1.5, 2.5…), so a bet is always over or under, never level, and never handed back.
- Committed before kick-off. A call goes into the Ghost Record before the match starts and is never edited afterwards, the losses included.
The match result (1X2)
Three outcomes: a home win (1), a draw (X) or an away win (2). Exactly one of them happens. The Ghost works out a chance for every scoreline from 0–0 to 10–10 (the method is on how the Ghost predicts) and adds up the scorelines where the home side has more, where the two are level, and where the away side has more. The three always come to 100%.
A match card names the likeliest result as the Ghost's call when it reaches 45%. Below that the match is too close for one result, and the card names a double chance instead (next). Where the bookmakers rate the Ghost's call more than two points lower than it does, the call is held back and the Ghost calls another market in its place, said on the card with the market's own number beside it when even that pick is a weak one.
Example. Arsenal 52%, draw 25%, Chelsea 23%: the call is "Arsenal win". A 2–1 Arsenal win lands it; a 1–1 draw or a Chelsea win misses it.
Double chance
Two of the three results together. "Arsenal or draw" (1X) wins on an Arsenal win or a draw; "Chelsea or draw" (X2) on a Chelsea win or a draw; "Arsenal or Chelsea (12)" on either side winning. Each loses one way only: on the result it leaves out, so a 12 loses on a draw. The Ghost adds the two results' chances.
A double chance comes in more often than a single result because it covers two outcomes of three, and its price is shorter for the same reason. The record keeps its calls apart from single results, so a run of double chances never makes the Ghost look surer than it is.
Example. "Arsenal or Chelsea (12)" at 75%: a 2–1 either way lands it; 0–0 or 1–1 misses it.
Total goals, over and under
Both sides' goals added up, at lines from 0.5 to 4.5. "Over 2.5" means three goals or more; "Under 2.5" means two or fewer. The Ghost adds up the scorelines on each side of the line. Over 0.5 is any goal at all; Under 0.5 is 0–0 alone.
Example. A 2–1 has three goals: Over 2.5 lands, Under 2.5 misses, Under 3.5 lands.
Both teams to score
"Yes" needs each side to score at least once; "No" needs at least one side to score nothing. The score does not matter beyond that: 1–1 and 4–3 are both a "Yes", and 3–0 is a "No". The Ghost takes away every scoreline in which a side scores nothing.
Clean sheet
A side keeps a clean sheet when the other side does not score, whatever it scores itself. "Arsenal clean sheet" lands on 0–0 and on 3–0, and misses on 3–1.
Each team's goals
One side's goals alone, over 0.5, 1.5 or 2.5, whatever the other side does. "Arsenal over 1.5 goals" needs Arsenal to score twice or more: a 2–3 defeat lands it, a 1–0 win misses it.
Asian handicap
One side starts with goals taken off or added on, and the bet is settled on the score after that. SoccerGhost prices the half lines −1.5, −0.5, +0.5 and +1.5, which can never end level.
- "Arsenal −0.5" is an Arsenal win, and "Arsenal +0.5" is Arsenal not losing: a win or a draw.
- "Arsenal −1.5" needs Arsenal to win by two goals or more: 2–0 lands it, 2–1 misses it.
- "Chelsea +1.5" needs Chelsea not to lose by two or more: a 2–1 Arsenal win lands it, 2–0 misses it.
Correct score
The exact 90-minute score. The Ghost lists the twelve likeliest scorelines with the chance of each. Even the likeliest is usually a long shot: on the 1,454 matches measured below, the likeliest score of a match had a median chance of 13%, and only one match in ten went above 16%. A correct-score pick misses most of the time by its nature.
Corners, cards and shots
Each match page also forecasts the corners, cards, shots and shots on target, from models of their own. These are for reading. They are not published as calls, they are not on the Ghost Record, and no bookmaker's price is shown for them, so the slip builder never uses them.
How the Ghost's numbers have come in, market by market
Measured on soccerghost.com's own forecasts for 1,454 finished matches from 4 to 24 October 2026: in each market, every selection the Ghost rated at 50% or more, what it said on average, and how often it came in, settled on the ninety minutes. The range is where the difference would be 95 times in a hundred from luck alone; a range that includes zero means the Ghost was on its number within luck.
| Market | Selections | Ghost said | Came in | Difference, 95% range |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Match result | 622 | 60.7% | 61.6% | +0.9 (−2.8 to +5.2) |
| Double chance | 3,740 | 71.2% | 71.4% | +0.1 (−0.4 to +0.9) |
| Over 1.5 goals | 1,440 | 75.9% | 77.3% | +1.4 (−0.3 to +3.3) |
| Over 2.5 goals | 796 | 59.2% | 62.6% | +3.4 (−0.2 to +7.3) |
| Under 2.5 goals | 658 | 59.5% | 55.5% | −4.0 (−7.3 to −1.3) |
| Under 3.5 goals | 1,410 | 71.4% | 67.9% | −3.5 (−6.4 to −1.4) |
| Both teams to score | 1,454 | 57.6% | 55.8% | −1.7 (−4.6 to +0.9) |
| A side over 0.5 goals | 2,792 | 73.2% | 75.8% | +2.5 (+1.3 to +4.1) |
| Asian handicap ±0.5 | 2,908 | 67.8% | 67.3% | −0.4 (−2.0 to +1.6) |
| Asian handicap ±1.5 | 2,908 | 81.7% | 82.0% | +0.4 (−0.6 to +1.2) |
What it says. The result, the double chance and the handicaps came in as often as the Ghost said. The goal lines did not quite: overs and goals for a side came in a little more often than said, and the stronger unders about four points less often. Most of these forecasts were made before dixon-coles-1.11, which from 25 October pulls each match's expected goals toward its competition's usual total for exactly that reason; the slip builder and the value check already hold an under or a "No" two points lower than the Ghost says. Whether that is enough is for the record to show.
These are the Ghost's forecasts for every market. The calls it commits, one headline a match and its value picks, are kept on the Ghost Record with the same comparison, updated as results come in.
Reading a price against the Ghost's number
A chance is a price turned round: the fair price for a chance is one divided by it. At 60% the fair price is 1.67. A bookmaker's price longer than that pays more than the Ghost's number says the bet is worth; a shorter one pays less. The market's own chance is each bookmaker's full set of prices with its margin taken out, and the middle of the bookmakers taken.
A Ghost value mark is stricter than a long price. It is shown only where a bookmaker that priced the whole market, seen in the last 2 hours, pays at least 2% over the market's own fair price; at least 3 bookmakers price the market; the market gives the bet at least 20%; two or more bookmakers offer it, the longest no more than 25% above the next; and the Ghost's own number agrees the price is worth taking, an under or a "No" held 2 points lower first. It is a statement about a price at one moment, and it lapses once that price is 2 hours old.
None of this makes betting pay. Replayed on past seasons, neither the Ghost's calls nor its picks in other markets made money at bookmakers' prices, which carry a margin. SoccerGhost is a second opinion built from football. It is for adults, 18 or over; if betting stops being fun, get help.