Most of us have been involved in gambling in one way or another – and before you say, no, you haven’t – yes, you have. Gambling or betting on things doesn’t necessarily need to be done in a casino, but there’s a good chance you already got started when you were just a child. We’ve all played cards (any game really) where the winner gets something, or the loser has to do a chore. I remember when I was in fifth grade when I made the weirdest bet ever – a friend of mine was so sure that the current date was…well, the wrong one…so I was happy to bet money on it. I won, obviously. So while you might be new to betting online, or betting in a land-based casino, you’re definitely not new to betting, or gambling in general.

But while you might not be new, going through a betting for beginners list might still be a good idea. Here are a few mistakes people make when they start betting on sports:

1. Which sport? This is one of the most general betting mistakes. All sports are different and you should always take that into consideration. Betting on football is not the same as betting on tennis. For example, in tennis you also need to consider the surface where the match is played (a weak player might win a way stronger opponent on a surface he’s an expert on).

2. The concept of value. Value isn’t your opinion. It’s the use of information, data, models as well as historical results. So you need to determine what the value is and then you can start to calculate expected value for any bet you place. Basically that shows you how much you could stand to win or lose, should you place the exact same bet multiple times.

3. Betting Money management. Your bet sizes should depend on your bankroll. And as a general rule you should not spend any more than 2% of your bankroll on ANY given bet.

4. Betting on too many games/races/matches. It’s easy to start betting on any game you see available, but that’s stupid. You should bet on games where you have made your own calculations as well. The more games you bet on, the better the chance that you don’t have a clue about many of the games, and the better chance becomes that you’ll end up making a huge donation to the bookmaker.

5. Don’t go on tilt. While this is more of a poker term, the basics remain the same – don’t start betting recklessly after experiencing bad luck.