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As UEFA EURO 2024 kicks off in Germany, bet365’s Steve Freeth looks back at an action-packed Premier League campaign, which saw Manchester City make history after seeing off Arsenal’s challenge to win a fourth straight title.
Freeth discusses the operator’s highs and lows from the 2023/24 season and looks back on the company’s Never Ordinary marketing campaign.
SBC News: The Premier League title race was dramatic until the very end when Manchester City won a fourth consecutive PL title – what betting insights do you have from the latest Premier League campaign?
Steve Freeth: The 2023/24 Premier League season saw bet365 launch our Never Ordinary marketing campaign, and it tied in nicely on an opening weekend which was a ‘Super Boost’ bonanza for customers.
Punters didn’t have to wait long to collect their first wins of the campaign, as we boosted Manchester City from 1/3 to Evens to beat Burnley, and paid out on the Citizens on 36 minutes when Erling Haaland made it 2-0 as our ‘2 Goals Ahead – Early Payout Offer’ was triggered.
The pre-season 8/11 outright favourites would only drift to 2/1 throughout the whole season, that being after the 0-0 draw against Arsenal with Liverpool then taking the role of favourites, albeit briefly at 6/5 – more on them later. Prior to kick-off at Turf Moor, bet365 had seen 48.9% of all Premier League outright bets placed on City, with Mikel Arteta’s Gunners the next best with 16.9% of all bets placed on them.
Arsenal’s dogged form towards the end of the campaign meant that they took the title race down to the last day, but 1/12 outright favourites City saw off a fading West Ham outfit with ease. It wasn’t all bad news for Gunners backers, Arteta’s side, who opened up at 11/4 in the ‘Without Manchester City’ market, was our 2nd worst Premier League ante-post result of the campaign and we were far happier on the liability front with Pep Guardiola landing his fourth consecutive crown instead of his fellow countryman grabbing his first.
It would be another Spaniard that would hit us hardest in 2023/24 – step-forward Unai Emery. The rise of Aston Villa is bad enough when you’re a West Brom fan, but the Lions wreaked havoc in a number of markets, most notably with a 32 point start on the Handicap (15/1 into 10/1 pre-season) giving us our worst result ante post result in the top flight. Not only that, their fourth placed finish had punters jumping for joy having been backed in the summer for Top Four (10/1 into 7/1) and Top Six (3/1 into 5/2) and then at 10/1 and 3/1 respectively after their heavy opening day defeat at Newcastle. Thank goodness they didn’t win another European trophy…
Liverpool also didn’t win a European trophy much to our relief having built up eye-watering liabilities on the Reds landing the Quadruple. The Reds had been 1500/1 for such a feat before a ball was kicked and we also saw a huge surge of interest when Jurgen Klopp announced his departure in January with those monster odds tumbling to 16/1 with the League Cup already in the bag. Fortunately for us, the likeable German would walk away with just one piece of silverware on his farewell tour.
Liverpool’s title challenge suffered a huge blow against Crystal Palace in mid-April, their first league defeat at Anfield since October 2022 with the high-flying Eagles flourishing under Oliver Glasner with their flying finish clearly taking our traders by surprise having priced them at 250/1 for a Top Half finish with just a few games to go including a 5-0 hammering of Villa on the final day.
Talking of the final day, while Manchester City were celebrating another title win, the Trading Floor at bet365 were enduring a miserable last round of fixtures.
A shockingly bad end to the 2023/24 campaign saw bet365 customers sign off in style with a full house of favourites winning on the Sunday. The 10 fold accumulator paid 103/1 at kick-off, of which nine were paid out early on thanks to our ‘2 Goals Ahead Offer’, and on top of that we had the 35% acca boost for all correct 10 folds, leaving us with our biggest payout of the campaign.
We weren’t upset for long however, as our partners at Oddschecker revealed their 2023/24 Premier League clickshare rankings, with bet365 retaining our crown as clickshare champions for another season. Our brand received over 21% of all clicks throughout the season, and our Bet Builder product also topped the charts with 39% of clickouts on the Oddschecker Bet Builder comparison tool.
SBC: Down at the bottom, all three promoted teams went straight back down – how has this impacted bet365’s trading performance this season?
SF: After romping to the Championship title in 2022/23, Burnley were odds on not to be relegated last season, beginning the campaign at 2/7 Not to be relegated, and 7/2 to finish in the top half.
That early season support quickly drained, and became embroiled in a relegation dogfight for the rest of the season.
Less was expected from Sheffield United and Luton, with the teams 4/7 and 1/3 to be relegated respectively. The Blades appeared in 17.6% of all pre-season relegation outright betslips with the Hatters appearing in 18%.
The price of all three promoted teams instantly returning to the second tier was 12/1 and although popular with the gap between the two divisions seemingly widening the relegation markets produced healthy profits.
The most backed team for relegation in pre-season were Wolves. The incoming Gary O’Neil not only guided his new team to safety, but at one point had them looking towards European football.
SBC: What offers and products did bet365 roll out this season and how have these products resonated with players?
SF: This season saw the integration of our Never Ordinary boosts into our portfolio of existing offers. The Super Boosts, Bet Boosts, Winnings Boosts and Acca Boosts have become a firm favourite with customers on a wide range of sports. We’re delighted to roll out our Boosts across the Euro Finals and Copa Championship, with a daily Super Boost delivered to customers at 12pm every matchday.
The Premier League really went goal crazy this season as fans witnessed a total of 1,246 goals were scored across 380 matches, resulting in an average of 3.28 goals per game.
But why was this great for bet365 customers? Well, after a record breaking premier League season, bet365 gave out more than £15 million in Bet Credits as part of our Goals Giveaway promotion. A popular free-to-play game with bet365, Goals Giveaway gives players the chance to win up to £50 in Free Bets every week of the season. Free Bets are awarded for individual matches that see four or more goals scored. What’s more, if all of a player’s matches cumulatively add up to 20 or more goals, we’ll award them further Free Bets on top of what they’ve already won.
In February, bet365 broadcasted its latest TV advert, as part of its global campaign, ‘Never Ordinary’, and in the now familiar setting of the epic stadium, it was the 2 Goal Early Payout Offer in the spotlight.
The bet365 2 Goals Ahead Early Payout Offer is an always-on promotion for all football fans, and available on over 80 leagues and competitions, where selections will be settled as a winner if the team you back goes two goals ahead.
The Early Payout offer is available on single and multiples, and can be enjoyed by new and eligible customers.
Unlike other operators, bet365’s Early Payout Offer is available on the standard Full Time Result market, rather than a separate coupon, meaning customers can take advantage of the offer at the best available prices.
Up to and including January 1st 2024, the bet365 Early Payout Offer had been paid out in 151 matches in the Premier League and Champions League.
Unsurprisingly, Manchester City have been involved in the most matches where the Early Payout was invoked, on 16 occasions. 10 of those matches were in the Premier League, and 6 in the Champions League. In all but one of those matches, it was City who went two goals ahead.
The 2 Goal Ahead Offer continued to resonate highly with players and came into its own on the final day of the Premier League season, where nine of ten matches were paid out early thanks to our fantastic offer.
