Correct score
A correct score bet is a wager on the exact scoreline of a match, usually the score at the end of normal time, and it only wins if every goal on both sides matches your pick. Because so many scorelines are possible, the odds are long and the bookmaker’s margin is spread across dozens of selections. This entry explains how the price converts into a probability, which minutes count towards settlement, and where the market gets mixed up with its close relatives.
How the odds and margin work
Every correct score price can be turned into an implied probability, and that is the first sum worth doing before you form any opinion of a market.
Take an illustrative price of 6/1 on a 1-1 draw. Fractional odds of 6/1 mean a stake of one returns six in profit plus the stake, so the implied probability is 1 divided by 7, or roughly 14.3%. In decimal terms that same price is 7.0, and the sum is identical: one divided by the decimal odds.
The margin, or overround, shows up when you add those probabilities across the whole grid. A fair book would total exactly 100%, and anything above that is the bookmaker’s built-in edge. Correct score grids run to many selections, and a small markup on each one adds up, so the total tends to sit noticeably higher than on a simple match result market. The exact figure varies by operator and by fixture, which is why the honest approach is to add up the grid in front of you rather than assume a standard number.
Only once you know that total can you say anything sensible about whether a price looks generous.
Which minutes count towards settlement?
In football, the standard correct score market settles on 90 minutes plus whatever stoppage time the referee adds. Extra time and penalty shootouts do not count unless the market says otherwise.
That matters most in cup ties. Betfair’s published 90-minute rule uses the example of a game level at 1-1 after normal time and won 2-1 in extra time: the winning correct score selection is 1-1, and anyone who backed 2-1 loses. Paddy Power’s football rules state the same principle for normal-time markets.
Extra time and abandonment
A separate extra-time correct score market exists at some bookmakers, and it starts again from 0-0. Only goals scored in the extra 30 minutes count, so a 2-2 draw after 90 minutes followed by a scoreless extra period settles as 0-0 in that market.
Abandoned matches are where practice varies most between operators. A correct score bet is commonly voided with the stake returned if normal time is not completed, but the window for a resumed game, and the handling of options such as “any other score”, differ from one set of terms to the next. Some operators settle a group or “any other score” selection when the result can no longer fall elsewhere, while others void everything, so the market rules on the site you use are the ones that decide.
What it gets confused with
The market most often mistaken for correct score is anytime correct score, which wins if your chosen scoreline appears at any point during normal time rather than at the final whistle.
Backing 1-0 anytime pays out the moment the first goal goes in for that side, even if the match finishes 3-2. The standard correct score bet on 1-0 would lose in that same game, so the two prices are never directly comparable.
Correct score also turns up inside other products. Some bookmakers offer first goalscorer and correct score doubles, often called a scorecast, and correct score legs are a regular feature of bet builders. In a bet builder the legs are priced together rather than simply multiplied, so the combined price will not always match what you would get by doubling the singles yourself.
One more point catches readers out with promotions. If you place a correct score bet with a free bet, a winning slip normally returns the winnings only, without the free bet stake, so a 6/1 winner on a free bet of ten pays sixty rather than seventy. Check the free bet terms on the specific offer, since that is where the stake treatment is written down.
