The Labouchere strategy is among the most popular betting strategies worldwide, especially among roulette players. It’s designed as a cancellation system or a negative progression where you cancel out numbers until you reach the desired number – which is the amount you want to win.
The strategy is primarily designed for even-money games like roulette, so using it for betting on sports can be a challenge, but it’s doable. You have to be prepared to do research when looking for betting opportunities.
Another challenge is understanding and executing the strategy itself. The Labouchere system is not the simplest betting system out there, so I suggest you grab a pen and a piece of paper and read my explanations of how the Labouchere betting system works in detail.
The Labouchere Betting Strategy
A brief history lesson: Henry Labouchere was a British journalist, politician, and writer who is most famous for revolutionising real-time journalistic reporting and devising a roulette betting strategy. The two aren’t even remotely connected, but it goes to show you the type of person he was, so you should expect a risky and opportunistic strategy.
The strategy itself is known by different names, such as the Reverse Martingale, the Las Vegas system, or the American progression. The objective is to set a goal that you want to achieve, and it works as a circle system where you should increase the bet size after each loss. This is much simpler on a roulette table because the system ideally works with even money bets.
It’s up to you to determine the goal for each cycle. After you do that, you should write down a sequence of numbers. You get to choose how many numbers your sequence will have, and what those numbers will be. However, the sum of all the numbers in your sequence must equal the target amount.
The idea behind it, like with most progression systems, is to cover for your losses by increasing the bet size. This is easier said than done, even though the strategy looks bulletproof on paper.
How Does The Labouchere System Work?
The system requires you to set a goal amount that you want to win. So, let’s say that our goal is £20. Now, we should come up with a sequence of numbers with a sum of 20. Although there are some tools that would do a sequence for you, I’ll show you how to do it manually.
I’ll keep the sequence short for simplicity. Also, this is what you will need the pen and paper for.
We can use the following sequence: 6, 2, 3, 3, 2, 4.
If we add all the numbers in the sequence: 6 + 2 + 3 + 3 + 2 + 4 = 20
Our wager size will always be the sum of the first and the last number of the sequence. So, our first wager in this case would be £10 (since 6 + 4 makes 10). As I mentioned, the strategy is designed for even money bets, so you will need to look for matches where both teams have almost equal chances of winning, or betting markets with odds of around 1/1 (or 2.0 in decimal odds, 100 in American odds). This can be a challenge, but I’ll get to that later.
We’ll start with the first wager of £10. Let’s say that you have won this wager. You now have to cross out the first and last number of the sequence, which, in our case, is 6 and 4.
We’re currently £10 in profit, and the remaining numbers in the sequence are: 2, 3, 3, 2.
For the next bet, we should bet £4, since 2 + 2 equals 4. Let’s say that we have won again. We’re now £14 in profit.
We cross out the first and the last number, and we’re left with 3, 3 in the sequence. We wager £6, and if we win, we will cross out every number in the sequence and finish the cycle with £20 in profit – which was our target goal.
The Endless Cycle Problem
But what happens if you lose a bet? Let’s say that we’ve lost our first bet of £10. In that case, we add the bet amount as the last number in the sequence. So, our Labouchere sequence would look like this:
6, 2, 3, 3, 2, 4, 10
Now, our next bet would be the sum of the sequence’s first and last numbers. 6 + 10 equals 16, so we wager £16.
The objective is to clear all the numbers in the sequence, but we expand the sequence after each loss. So, it doesn’t take a genius to understand the Labouchere system’s major flaw: the cycle can go forever.
The system can easily drain your bankroll if you lose several bets in a row. Imagine this: if we lose our next wager, we would have to bet £22. Not only do we increase our bet size, but we’re further away from the goal. We would now have to win 5 bets in a row to achieve the goal, which is easier said than done.
To tackle this problem, you need to set a goal that’s small enough, and, ideally, make the sequence as short as possible. You should also prepare a bankroll that’s large enough to accommodate several consecutive losses, and be patient.
Labouchere Betting System Example
The system has been designed for bets where the implied probability is (approximately) 50%. This is very easy to achieve in casino games like roulette, but rather rare in sports betting. Although you may find markets with odds of 1/1 or close to 1/1 (like 11/10, or 6/5), there are other factors that contribute to sports betting too. It’s easy to back Red or Black numbers in roulette, but in sports betting, you will have to back the team or a player just because the odds are 1/1.
Let’s say Manchester United is playing against Liverpool and the odds for Liverpool to win are 1/1 (or 2.0 in decimal odds). We set our target goal at £10, and we create a sequence like this:
1, 2, 4, 1, 2
We now have to wager £3 on Liverpool to win. If the Reds win, you will have to cross out the first and the last number of the sequence. We cross out 1 and 2 in our sequence, and we should wager £3 again. We got this number by summing the first and last numbers of the sequence, 2 and 1.
We should now look for another market with odds of 1/1. Let’s say that Chelsea is playing Tottenham and the odds for Chelsea to win are 1/1. We wager £3 and if we win again, we’re £6 in profit, and the only number left in the sequence is 4.
We should now find another market with odds of 1/1. Let’s say that we’ve found such market. We wager £4, and if we win, our net profit reaches £10, which means that we have achieved our goal.
Advantages and Disadvantages of the Labouchere Betting System
The Labouchere betting system has a slower progression than the Martingale system, for example, where you have to double the wager size after each bet. This makes it a more viable option for long-term gains, but it’s not without some inherent weaknesses.
Pros
- You can choose your own target goal
- You don’t need a tremendous bankroll to use it
- You choose the numbers you will use in your sequence, so you can adjust the pace based on your bankroll
- It can be used for various sports and betting types
- It’s much more conservative than the Martingale system
Cons
- It can drain your bankroll if you experience several consecutive losses
- It’s best suited for games such as roulette, so there are much better sports betting systems out there
- Finding suitable betting markets can be a challenge
- It’s not as easy to understand and execute, and you need to pay attention and adjust the sequence after each bet
- It can be very time-consuming, as you must wait for each bet to be settled before continuing the cycle
Is the Labouchere Betting System a Good Strategy for Sports Bettors?
The short answer is no. Although the Labouchere system can be used for sports betting, and you can have success with it, it’s not a good long-term option. Almost all progression strategies are better suited for games such as roulette, blackjack, or other situations where the implied probability is close to 50%.
There are other, much more important factors that impact the outcome of sporting events. The form, injuries, home-ground advantage, and weather are just some of the variables that impact the outcome of the game. You are more likely to find value bets by doing extensive research than relying on the Labouchere system.
If you do decide to use the Labouchere system for sports betting, however, I suggest sticking to sports where there are only two potential outcomes, such as tennis or even basketball, or betting on different bet types, such as Over/Under.
