How To Legally Bet On The French Open Online
With the French Open just around the corner, the prospect of placing wagers on this long-running international tennis tournament is a lure that not many sports bettors and tennis fans around the world can resist. Fortunately, those wondering how to legally bet on the French Open online will be happy to know it’s possible if you stick to reputable sportsbook sites like Bovada or BetOnline, which accept players from America, the United Kingdom and elsewhere with absolutely no legal issues whatsoever. That’s incredibly good news considering the hundreds of millions of dollars that will be bet on this tournament – the second of four in the annual Grand Slam series - and the massive fan support the French Open enjoys worldwide.
Our comprehensive guide will show you how to legally bet on the French Open online by giving you all the information you need to get in on the action. We’ll take a deeper look at everything from the current odds available on the betting boards at the leading sportsbook sites to explanations of the different wager types, and even an overview of our most recommended betting sites.
Is It Legal To Bet On The French Open In The USA?
Before we get too far into the details of how to go about placing bets on the action set to take place in late spring on the clay courts at le Stade Roland Garros, we should answer the most pertinent question, which is if it is legal to bet on the French Open in the USA. As we’ve alluded to previously, offshore sportsbook sites like Bovada and BetOnline are your best bets for wagering on the French Open, and there are several good reasons for this. In the US in particular, there are several anti-sports gambling laws in place (from the Wire Act of 1961 to the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006 to local state laws that differ in each region) that make betting on sports difficult at best and impossible at worst throughout most of the nation.
That being said, sports betting sites based in other countries that have more favorable gambling laws are not beholden to the laws that make the practice so difficult in the US. This isn’t to say that our most-recommended sites aren’t subject to any regulations – far from it: all the best French Open betting sites are completely licensed by the gaming authorities in their home nations. That means that whether you’re in the US, the UK or somewhere else in the world, you can enjoy legally betting on the French Open online.
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Current French Open Betting Odds
Current French Open betting odds can’t be found quite yet, but once the field is set and the tournament gets closer to starting, you’ll be able to find a seemingly endless amount of betting opportunities. French Open betting odds can include picking outright winners of the tournament, picking winners of a particular set, or even proposition bets that might not have anything directly to do with a match. These types of betting opportunities are available for both the Men’s and Women’s side so be sure to check out on of the online offshore sportsbooks we recommend to find odds for your favorite tennis player.
How To Read Tennis Odds
Now that we’ve taken a look at the current odds, it’s a good idea to do a quick refresher course on how to read tennis odds. Bovada (and other US-friendly online sportsbooks) uses American-style odds, otherwise known as moneyline odds, which list the odds in terms of units of $100 risked and won by picking winners. Favorites, for instance, have odds that typically begin with a minus sign (-), while the underdogs typically have odds starting with a plus sign (+). In the case of favorites, hypothetical moneyline odds of -120 would mean that a punter or bettor needs to bet $120 in order to win another $100, whereas a bet on an underdog with odds of +150 means you’ll win $150 on a winning bet of $100.
European betting sites, on the other hand, use the fractional odds system, which is most easily understood as a ratio between the amount of money to be risked and the amount of money to be won on a given wager. For instance, if we were looking at 5/9 fractional odds, then that would mean a bettor will win $5 for every $9 bet. The main thing to remember about fractional odds is that if the fraction is less than 1/1 (which is also known as an “odds on” or “even” situation), then you will need to risk more than you stand to win. While used by Europe for all sports betting, fractional odds are almost exclusively used in American racebooks, as this is the specific custom for horse racing betting. (Sometimes you will also come across a decimal odds system in certain regions around the world, but these are not used at US-facing sports betting sites.)
Types Of Tennis Bets
All the leading sportsbook sites offer various types of tennis bets, and we’ll take a closer look at those different methods so you can have a better understanding of the different means available to you when you’re ready to get in on the action of legally betting on the French Open.
Set Betting
Set betting involves picking not just the outright winner of a match, but how that winning player will actually achieve victory – and as the French Open requires a five-game set, that means your choice will have to win at least 3-of-5 sets in order to take the match.
Match Betting
Match betting is probably the most popular way to legally bet on the French Open, as it is by far the easiest means of getting in on the action. All you’ll need to do is pick which player in the matchup you think will be the outright winner in the match.
Total Games Over/Under
If you don’t want to bet on the winner and loser of a given French Open match, you can always enjoy a total game over/under style wager. In this betting type, a successful wager is the one that accurately predicts whether the total number of games is greater than or less than the number predicted by the bookies.
French Open Proposition Bets
Prop bets are other popular ways to legally bet on the French Open at legal betting sites and are often used as a means of supplementing a bettor’s main wagers in order to maximize winnings. Props fall into two broad categories. There are player props and game props, both of which involve the specific outcomes of various criteria either for an individual athlete or the match as a whole. Some common prop bets include wagers on the total number of aces or double faults during the game or whether a given player will score a certain number of total points in a match.